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THE TEAM MAY 2000ISSUE #474

El Supremo & FounderWayne Green W2NSD/ l

Associate PublisherF. L Marion

Executive EditorJack Burnett

Managing EditorJoyce Sawtelle

THE NEW!

AmateurRadio Today

TABLE OF CONTENTSTechnical Ed ito rLarry Antonuk WB9RRT FEATURES DEPARTMENTS

. 23 OAP with the OHA 500 - AB0CDMissed out on building an HW-9?Here 's the nexl besl thing.

E-:\Iaildesig n73@ ao1.com

KB7NON6NRWSACMK00V

Contr ibuting CulpritsMike Bryce WB8 VGEJim Gray Wl xunJack Heller KB7NQChuck Houghton WB61GP

Andy MacAl lister W5ACMJoe Moell K0 0 VSteve Nowak KE8YNI4

Dr. Rick Olsen N6NR

Advertising SalesEvelyn Garrison WS 7A2 1704 S.E. 35th 51.

Issaquah WA 98029425-557-9611Fax : 425-557-9612

Circ ulationFran ces Hyvarinen

Data Ent ry & Other StuffNorman Marion

10

16

27

36

14

When Less is More - N1 FNCheck out the excitement of QRP

Build and Compare - KG4CUYLearn about receivers from these two simple designs.

Read All About It! - K8JWAPart 3 of good stuff from The Hertzian Herald.

You're So Vain - AC3l .You probably think this article is about you.

REVIEWSExploring the Kenwood TM·D700A - KE8YN/4Part 1.. Overview and installation.

WB61GP 414964sa444752548

W2NSDI1 44833

KE8VNl4 57W1XUn 60WB8VGE 56

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Above and BeyondAd IndexBarter 'n ' BuyCalendar EventsThe Digital PortThe DX ForumHamsatsHoming InLettersNever Say DieNew ProductsOn the CoverOn the GoPropagationORPORXRadio Bookshop

Wattmeter Winner - AC4HF73 reviews LOG's OWM-4 digital wattmeter kit.

Another look at the NW-40 - K4CHEEMTECH's QRP transceiver kit proves a winner.

Business Office 30Editorial - Advertisirg . Circulationseeonack • Product Reviews73 Amateur Radio Today Magazine 3870 Hancock Rd.Peterborough NH 03458-11 07603·924·0058Fax: 603·924·8613 QRH • • •

Web Pagewww.waynegrecn.com

Reprints: $3 per articleBack issues: $5 each

Continued on page 6

necessarily indicative of that individual's ability tocon tribute to the advancement of the radio art ," the

FCC sa id.

Besides drastically streaml ining the Amateu r Ra­

d io licensing process, the FCC sa id its actions would

"eliminate unnecessary requirements that may dis­

courage or limit ind ividuals from becoming trained

operators, technicians. and electronic expe rts."

Although no new Novice and Advanced licenseswill be issued after the effective date of the Report

and Order, the FCC does not plan to automatically

Restructuring SummaryFor those of you who never got it, or got it and

stil l don 't get it, here is a good review of the basics

of the FCC's recent Report an d Order restructuring

the ARS .

The bottom line was that starting onApril15, 2000,there wou ld be the license classes - Technician,

General, and Amateur Extra - and a single Morse

code requi rement - 5 wpm.

;'We be lieve that an individual's ability to dem­

onstrate increased Morse code profic iency is no t

73 Amateur Rad io Today ( ISSN 105 2-2522) is published monthly by 73 Magazine. 70 N202 , Peterborough NH03458· 1107. The entire contents C 2000 by 73 Magaz ine. No part of this publ ication may be reproduced withoutwritten pe rmiss ion of the pub lisher, Wh ich is not all that diff icu lt to gel. The subs crip tion rate is : one yea r$24.97, two years $44 ,97 ; Canad a: one year $34 ,21, two yea rs $57 .75 , inc lud ing po stage and 7% GST.Foreign postage: $1 9 surface , $42 airmail add it iona l per yea r, payab le in US fundS on a US bank. Secondc lass postage is paid at Peterborough , NH, and at addit ional mailing otti ces. Can ad ian secon d class mailregist ration #1 7810 1. Canad ian GST registr at ion #1 25393314, Microf ilm edition. Univers ity Micro film, AnnArbor MI 48 106, POSTMASTER : Send add ress chang es to 73 Amateur Radio Today, 70 Hancock Rd"Pete rboroug h NH 034 58· 11 07. 73 Amateur Rad io Today is owned by Snabromat Way Ltd. of Hancock NH.

Manuscripts: Contributions forpossible publication are mostwelcome. We'lldo the best wecan toreturn anything you request, but weasscrre no responsibility for lossor oamage. Payment for scorrsneoarnoes will be made after peblkatonPlease submit both a disk and ahard copy of your article [IBM (ok)or Mac (preferred ) formats), carefullychecked drawings and scoer ercs.and the clearest, best focused andlighted photos you can manage. "Howto wtlte for 73" gudelines areavailableon reocest, US citizens, pleaser cuoe j'3ur Social Security numberwith scomoeo manuscripts so we can

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ARRL's New President

With ~Iay 5. 2000, looming, I I see where the ARRL direc-got out my copy of Richard tors have elected a new presi -Koone's 51512000 let' the Utu- dent. Yes, that got me to think-/Ill/Ie D i saster book. Well. it ing. In my memory, I can't thinkwon't be long before 515, like of a single ARRL presidentY2K, is history. Will the every that 's made even the slightestsix thousand year alignment of mark on the bobby. It's a posi-the planets, plus the build up of non of enormous perceived pres-ice, off center, at the poles, trig- tige and virtually zero irnpor-ger a pole shirt? Could Nos- tnncc. The reali ty that I see istradamus. in his prediction of a that the ARRL presidency is acoming pole shift. which he said show position . with no morewould wipe out 97% of man- power over the League than thekind. he off by a few years'? Will directors. and that, in my expert -

.r cnce. has also approached zero.Chct Snow's Mass Dreams OJIt's all a necessary facade to bel-the FIIII/re. which also predicts a ...

mass extinction at around this stcr the pretense that the Leagueis somehow connected to thetime, he wrong, too? Thenmembers.there's Rene's W.\'I Skeptic of

Science, which makes a really The League is actually run bygood case for past pole shirts a small group at HQ, and all the

rest seems to be just windowhaving caused mass ext inctions.

Chet Snow's hook was the rc- dressing. Who you elect as direc-tors is irrelevant, and who they

suit of projecting hundreds ofeo elect as preside nt seems ditto.people under hypnosis into thcirnext lives, l ie found that 98% No, 1 see the League as not

even remotely democratic . It's a....'ere unable to rctncurnatc in the commercial publishing house21st century, due to an acute posing as a membership organ»shortage of babies. By the nnd zation in order to get preferentialcentury it was down to 90% un - tax and postal advantages.able to reincarnate. He traced [ remember the most presri­this hack to some sort of cates- gious president they ever had,trophe in the very early 2 1st Herbert Hoover Jr.. the son ofcentury. Like around now, the president who got the blame

Okay, okay, so maybe Nos- for the depression that Congress.tradamus has just made a long bowing to pressure from thestreak of incredibly lucky guesses- banks, caused - mainly within the past. And though J.B. the Hoot-Smalley tariff act. WallRhine 's work 50 years ago. plus Street collapsed like the house ofthat more recently at the Prince- cards it was and it took \\/W[I toton PEAR Labs. has scicntifi- get us out of the mess.cally proven the reality of pre- I talked with Hoover W6Z H acognition. with Dean Radin's The few times and found him a nircConscious Universe leaving even guy, but not top-heavy withthe most dedicated skeptics no brain power. By a strange coinci-place to hide from the results of dence. Hoover resigned as prcs i-hundreds of scientific research dent of the League just threeprojects, outfits such as SCICOP days after I visi ted his goodhave their blinders strapped on so friend Barry Goldwater K7UGA,tightly that no amount of scientific and explained in detail the manyproof is visible. ways the League General Man-

So, I" ll be seeing you in June, nger had been taking advantageright '? Either here in my edito- of Hoover 's naiv ety, gelling himrial. or in a truly massive crowd to do the League's dirty work -at the Pearly Gates. Whistle your such as visiting the president ofcall. if you' re a ham. so I can Venezuel a to get the ham radiofind you. exhibit out of the Venezuelan4 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

exhibit at the New York World'sFair.

The ham man ufacturers, infrustration over the League' sham station in the Coca Cola ex­hibit, which they felt had beensold out 10 Hallicrattcrs, had madea deal with Venezuela to featurea large operating ham radio sta­tion as the centerpiece of theirexhi bit. It was beautiful andshowed off the equipment of allof the ham manufacturers (ex­ccpt Hallicraftcrs. naturally).

The original deal between theLeague and Coca Cola, accord­ing to Bill Leonard W2SKE,who set the deal up in the firstplace and was a very good friendof mine (we fl ew around thewor ld together, visiting 26 COUll­

tries and operating Oil 20m fromthe plane as we fl ew), was forthe ham station to take up mostof the ground floor of the exhibitbuilding. When Bill learned thatthe League General Manager hadmadc <In under-the -table $25 ,000deal with Hallic raners to useon ly their equipment , he told mehe then informed his contact atCoca Cola. The company quicklycanceled thei r plans for the bigexhibi t and gave the leag ue asmall room on the second tloor,next to the toilets, for their exhibit.Few fairgocrs ever saw ARRL'sham exhibit.

Meanwhile , Ha mmcrtund spt'ar­headed a ham industry coopera­tive effort to get a better show­place for the hobby. They gotVenezuela to go for it. The re­sulting exhibit was one ha mscould be proud of und was visitedby millions of fuirgoers.

ARRL HQ was furious, sothey got Hoover to try to get thepresident of Venezuela 10 stopthe competing ham station .

Well, that was just one of manytimes ARRL used Hoover's name,as I explained to Barry.

Oops, I sure got off all a tan­ge nt. Fortunately, that hardlyever happens.

Now, is the above "trashing theLeague"? Or is it just expressingmy opinion, based on the facts asI understand them - as a 60­year loyal member? Yes, I'mcritical of some of the things HQdocs . hut I' m far more cri ticalof the things they don' t do, butshould .

The League does a nice job ofpuhlishing. Oh. I'd run QST dif­fcrcntly, if I was the publisher.hut they put out some excel lentbooks. And where would we bewith out their Q&A manuals tomake gelling a ham tic ket just amailer of memorizing a few A's?That's all I had to do. Later theNavy did a wonderful job ofteaching me electronic theory.

I" d like to see the ARRL di­rectors communicating from themembers to HQ rather than theother way around. The operationof the League has always beenmuch more like the Kremlinthan Congress. I' d like to sec aLeague president who had thepowe r to hire and fire the HQstaff. and who would he paidsomething more than an expenseaccount. We (speaking as a mem­ber) need a pres iden t who canget on A,\1 radio and TV andhelp promote the hobby. Weneed one who can visi t the headsof fore ign countries and helpamateur radio to grow in thosecountries, as I did when I visitedKi ng Hussein, This kind of ac­tivity could help us a lot whenamateur radio matters are up forvotes at fut ure Intern ationalTelecommuni cations Union con­ferences, whe re we need asmany countries supporting us aswe can get.

I' ll tell you what. Find theo ldest ARRL member you canand ask him to ci te one singlething any ARR L president hasever done of any signi ficance forthe hobby. Please advise .

Continued on p age 3 4

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cOIHinued Jrom page 1

upgrade any existing license privileges. The AAhad proposed a one-t ime, across-the ­board upgrading of current Novice and Tech Pluslicensees toGeneral class, but the FCCdeclinedto adopt the idea. This means that current lic­ensees will retain their current operating privi­leges. including access to various modes andsubbands, andwill be able to renew their licensesindefinitely.

Starting April 15, 2000, individuals who quali·fied for the Technician class licenseprior10March21, 1987, would be able to upgrade to Generalclass by providing documentary proof to a Volun­leer Examiner Coordinator, paying an applicationfee, and completing FCC Form 605.

The FCC's decision not 10 automatically up­grade Novice and Tech Plus licensees meansthe current Novice/Tech Plus HF subbands wi llremain and not be 'retarmerr to higher class uc­ensees as the ARRL had proposed. The FCCsaid it did not refarm these subbands becausethe re was "no consensus" with in the amateurcommunity as to what to do with them.

The FCC decided to lump Technician andTechPlus licensees into a single licensee database,all designated as "Technician" licensees. Thosewho can document having passed the 5 wpmMorse code examination will continue to havethe current Tech Plus HF privileges. The FCCsaid it may request documentation from a lic­ensee or VEC to verify whether a licensee haspassed a teleg raphy exami nation.

The FCC action also authorizes AdvancedClass hams to prepare and administer Generalclass examinations, and eliminates Radio Ama­teur Civil Emergency Service (RACES) stationlicenses, RACES will remain, however.

Under the new licensing scheme, there will befour examination elements. Element 1will be the5 wpm Morse code exam. Element 2 will be a35-q uestion Techn ician exam; Element 3 will bea 35-question General exam; and Eiement 4 willbe a 50-question Amateu r Extra exam. The FCChas left it in the hands of the National Confer­ence of VECs Question Pool Committee to de­termine the specific mix and makeup of writtenexamination questions,

Elimination of the 13 and 20 wpm Morse re­quirements means an end to physician cert ifica­tion waivers for applicants claiming an inability topass the Morse code examination due to physicalhandicap.

The FCC disagreed with the League's sugges­tion that it undertake a restructuring of operatingprivileges along with licensing restructuring .TheCommission said it wanted to give the amateurcommunity a chance to "reach a consensus" re­garding new technologies before if tried to restruc­ture amateur operating privileges and frequencies.

A copy of the entire Report and Order (FCC99·412) is available at [www.arrl.org/announce/regulatory/wt98-143ro.pdf] or [www.fcc.govf

6 73 Amateur Radio Today· May 2000

Daily-Releases/Daily-Business/1999/db9912301~CC994 12.txtJ .

Thanks to the January 2000 issue ofWIRELOOSE, monthly newsletter of Woodbridge(VA) Wireless Inc.

51. Louis =HeilsJulie Heil is a local morning anchor for "Good

Morning America" on Channel 30. Just a few re­mote control buttons away, her father, Bob "HighTech" Heil, is the guy with ali the high-tech andelectronicsanswerson OhannelS's morning show.

"We're never on opposite each other: Juliesaid . "I usually miss him because he's on theearly block. I'm usually in the shower or hittingthe snooze button."

Bob hits the ChannelS airwaves during theweek in the 5 to 7 a.rn. slot. and Julie is on be­tween 7 and 9 a.m. Monday through Friday during"Good Morning America:

II's a miracle that both she and her father areon the early shows, because neither of them is amorning person, Julie said. "I think ir s genetic."

Bob said he always watches Julie. If he can't,he tapes the show and watches it late r. Then theentire family can watch Julie and critique her hair,makeup, and script.

'T hey are tougher on me than the news direc­tor: Julie said with a laugh. "He thinks he's ha rdon me? He should come listen to my family."

'W ell, I usually tell her her hair didn't look sogood or something. Or hershirt looked nice: Bobsaid, "I critique the good and the bad,"

'What are parents for? They are very honestabout it," Julie said.

Julie, 31, of Fairview Heights, has been amorning news anchor for KD NL, Channel 30,since January.

Bob, 58, of Belleville, has been the high -techguy at Channel 5 for about a month. He also ownsHeil Sound Ltd. in Fairview Heights.

"For some reason, the guys at Channei 5 won'tlet me wear my but ton," Bob said chuckling. "Thebutton says, 'Watch my daughter Julie, next onChannel 30.'"

Julie said she decided to pursue a broadcast­ing career because she grew up listening 10 herdad on KMOX radio and meeting people in theentertainment business.

"Beinq around my dad and his lifestyle, I wasalways in front of people . I was in theater andmusicals in high school ," Julie said. "I think I'mthe shyest person in the world, but I've learnedto overcome it."

When Julie decided she wanted to pursue acareer in television broadcasting.she knew exactlywhat position she wanted.

"When she was in high school, I asked herwhat she wanted to do," Bob said. "She said shewanted to be a news anchor for Channel 5'­

Using connections he made through his hamradio hobby, Bob knew someone who knewsomeone who was able to arrange for Julie to

be on the set of "The Today Show" in New Yorkto watch Jane Pauley in action.

"When you are 18 years old and standing onthe set of The Today Show' and you just startedbroadcasting school, mat's just a great incentive:Julie said . "Jane is one of the biggest people inbroadcasting whom I admire."

Before landing the news anchor position atChannel 30, Julie worked the "vampire shitt" atChannelS. "I met a lot of wonderful people atChan nel 5 who are still friends," Julie said.

"And people are always coming up to me andasking me about he r," Bob added .

Although Bob enjoys his spot on Channel 5.he said he misses radio.

"i had an hour on KMQX. I get three minuteson ChannelS . What can I do in th ree minutes?"he asked. "I miss taking calls from people, too . Ilike talking to people. But. I can show things onTV that I couldn't on the radio:

Before moving to Channel 30, Julie was at anABC affi liate station , WAND, in Decatur. Sh ewanted to come back to the St. Louis market andto her fami ly. Through an agent, Julie learnedthat Channel 30 had an opening . The agent alsoknew that Bob knew the news director and rec­ommended she ask her dad to get in touch withthe news director.

"He knew the news director from when he wasat KMOX: Julie said. "He called down there andtouched base with him."

Dad opened the door, and then it was up toJulie to prove herself.

Julie said she loves her job and enjoys goingto work - even if she does have to get up withthe chickens.

"For me to get up that early in the morningwhen I'm not a morning person tells me I'm inthe right job with the right people," sh e says.

Reprinted with permission from and thanks toJennifer A. Bowen, Editor, Lifestyle section,Belleville (IL) News-Democrat.

Johnson Space CenterAmateur Radio ClubOffers "RemoteMembership'-" _

The Johnson Space Center Amateur RadioClub, in the NASA com plex in Houston TX, isoffering "remote membership" to anyone wish­ing to join. The JSARC is the club which , amonglots of activities, teaches astronauts to be hamradio operators. The club's callsign is W5RRR.Membership is $15 per year, and patches areavailable as well.

For more information, please contact club sec­retary Larry Dietrich. at (281) 483-9198, or E­mail him at [Idietric@ems.jsc.nasa.gov].

Thanks to Kent Castle, NASAlHouston, andtheJanuary 2000 Sadger State Smoke Signals. ED

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LETTERSFrom the Ham Shack

Dan Calza rctta .sX9C. I have fi nishedread ing the FCC info 011 res tructuring (40pages of report an ti 30 supplem enta l page s).T his is what I th ink: Overall. I think it is agrea t idea. [ am also glad about the code ­and I do 90% of my operating on CW! Ireally ag ree with the statement by the FCC:CW proficiency does not mean good opcrer­jog skills .

I j us t don' , buy the argument tha t 1 seeon some o f the ham radio newsgro ups thatthe bands are goi ng to he flooded by CBe rs.First. I hear some awful stuff on 80 and 20meters NOW, and these people had to passAT LEAST a 13 wpm code test.

J thin k the real key is better e nfo rce­ment by the FCC (wh ich seems to hehappening) and bcucr "self-polic ing" by theham com munity.

It also means that every sing le amateurrad io operator has a rcsponsibi li ly. We mustshow off o ur hohhy and hel p those inte r­ested in becomi ng hams to understand whatham radio is about. I teach at a small prt­vale sc hool and have a h:l111 radio cl ass and

clu b sta tion (N7XP - the Paci fic C restCom muni ty School Amateu r Radio Cl uh inPortla nd. Oregon) . Kids sti ll get excited

about ham radio. despite what we hear aboutvideo games and the Internet.

What REAL LY disturbs me is all of the" us" ve rs us " the m" tha t I see o n t he

newsgroups. Real hams and no t real hams.Ugghhhh. We arc all hams . This is a hobby.It is su pposed to be fu n. And let's face it. ifwe don't gel new peop le in we ALL willlose our frequenc ies due to lack of activity.

As 10 the code, this is where the most vio­lent confro ntat io ns are happen ing in thencwsgroups. (And by the way, talk abou tpoor "operating" skills. Hopefully. most ofthe hams who arc posting to the newsgroupsspend more time on the Internet tha n on therad io. They mu st be terrible operators basedon thei r fo ul lang uage and lack of intclli­gent d isco urse on the Web! ) Again, I LO VEC WO But I think that CW test ing is no moreor less val uable than testing somconc's abil­ity 10 se t up and se nd various data modes,or the abili ty to construct a basic circu it, etc.,etc . I sec it not as a way to determine ho w

dedicated someone is to ham radio as muchas a " tha t' s ho w I d id it and eve ryoneel s e s ho uld. to o " r e spon se by som eha ms. I do thi n k , th ou g h. tha t the C Wpo rt io ns of the hands shoul d be protected

8 73 Amateur Radio TOday ' May 2000

fo r that exc lusive use (a long with da ta

modes where appropriate).The thing that is really regrettable about

all of this is the hatred hams arc feeling to­ward each other no w. W ho cares what classo f license people are . Le t's all have fun . Iventure into the No vice CW portion o f the

bands and the Novice/Tech Plus portions of10 meters whenever I can. Let' s welcomepeople and embrace what they have to offerto the hobby and stop co mplaining aboutwh at cl ass license they are and wh et her theytook a 5 wpm le st or 20 wpm tes t or no codete st wh atsoever.

I guess it is up 10 all of us as hams to dothe fo llowing: ( I) Help people get into thehobby. (2) Once they are in. treat them alleq ually regard le ss of license class. (3 ) Begood operators. so people learn by examplehow it should be done. (4) Stop fighting witheach other, so we don 't lose o ur freq uen­c ies. (5) Co ntinue to push the FCC for bet­ter enfo rce me nt of the rules.

Well. I know that is a bit lo ng-winded,bu t you are a lways ask ing for people to

write! Kee p up the good work.

II.B. (Cor k) Corcoran W 5BYG. Hi.Wayne : I' ve been a fa n of yo urs since I firstst arted reading CQ, and I was a very earlysubsc riber to 73. T here arc only two maga~

zincs where the first thing I read is the edi­torial. O ne was Astounding, no w AnalogScience Fiction. while John Campbel l waseditor, and the other is 7J. Now 10 the rea­sons for this note . One of the subj ects thatwas me ntioned had to.do with learning thecode . Wayne. I haven't read your boo k onthe subject so some of this may be redun­d ant. I learned the code the wrong way, asmo st of us did , by memori zing the dits anddahs of each letter at a slo w speed a nd thenslogging my way up ward to wa rd 13 wpm ,hitting the proverbial wa ll at about 9 or 10wpm. whic h seemed to take forever beforebreaking through. T hen m y m ind fi nallyswitc hed the way it was decoding the le t­ters from the sound pieces of the letter tothe sound o f the who le leu er. When thi shappened, my speed sho t up to about 15wpm in a matter of only a few days. I sus­pect this is what you advocate in yo ur book,and thai is learning the so und of the wholeletter at about 15 wpm from the very begin­ning . No w comes the reason for all this pre­liminary discussion. A group o f us that were

Number 8 on your Feedback card

me mbers of the McDonne ll Do uglas Ama­

te ur Radio Club at our astro nauti cs faci li tyin Huntington Beach CA (where the Satu rnS-IV was designed and b ui ll) started prac­tici ng our code each day in one of the con­te rence rooms d u ring lu nch. T h is wasseveral years ago, and we we re using a reel­to-reel tape recorder with the 3-3/4 , 7-112,and 15 ips se lec tor switch. We we re work­ing on 15 wpm. O ne day when the code

started. it was comi ng a t us at 30 instead o f15 wpm bec ause someone el se had use d therecorde r a nd had changed the playbac kspeed . Before the person runni ng the tapescould get hack over to the recorder, severalof us had sa id. "j us t leave it there for liveminutes ." whi ch he d id . Admitted ly. I wasonly able to copy a few leiters durin g theti me at that speed. but when we slowed thetape down to normal. it seeme d so slow thatwe had all day between letters. We st arteddo ing th is dou ble -speed session for the firs tfi ve minutes every day, and the rate that o urco py speed started to progress was incrcd­lbtc. It seemed like it was no time at all be­fo re I was copying at 24 wpm. At thi s speed,

another su rprising thi ng happened . I startedrecognizing the sound o f whole words andbegan to fin a lly understand ho w o ld-t imerscould he ad co py code al what to me wa sincred ib le speeds of 40 or 50 wpm andabove. T hey wcrcn' t listening to the leiters.they we re lis tening to the words, and it wasjust like someone ta lking to the m. One ofthe things that rea lly he lped im prove myaccuracy and red uce e rrors was to fo rcemyse lf to copy behind by at least one letter.T his allo wed the brain to make correct ionsand e liminate antic ipation o f the next lettera s a wo rd de veloped be fore writing the

wrong lette r o n the paper. The further he­hind you can co py, the fe wer mi stake s youmake .

Good advice.' And yes, the secret of my .Bl it: Code Cours e is in starting 'em outlearning the sound ofthe letters, not the dotsand dashes. A nd then graduating to words.Tens of thousands have aced the code testafter a weekend of practice this way. Burthat'll soon be irrelevant, with my one-hour5 wpm super-blitz method being all that'sneeded. - Wayne. fa

S h in : a d e vic e for fi nding fu rni ture in

the d a rk.

•

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When Less Is MoreCheck out the excitement of QRP.

About twenty years ago, when I first became interested in ama teur radio, I was Elmeredby some old-timers who delighted in telling me stories of what the hobby was like "backin the oid days. " Not only did they have to walk ten miles to school every day carryingtheir little brother and sister on their back, they had to pass a "real " examination,draw the schematic for a trip le-conversion radio from memory, design a linear amplifierbased on beer bottles, and send the en ti re text of the US Declaration of Indep endencea t 30 wpm with no mistakes. They had to cut the firewood to make the fire to makethe steam 10 generate the electricity 10 run their radios, which of course they hadmade themselves from a handful of p aper clips, rocks, and spit. Twenty years Inrtherdown the coax, I'm the ol d-timer, entertain ing the current crop ofnewbies with talesfrom the Golden Age of Ham Radio. I'm sure they think my stories are j ust as far -fetched,but l have a big advantage because I can literally recreate tl,at world for them, throughthe wonders of modem QRP.

quality of Q RP equipment. can he ex.­plai ncd very easily with a litt le math . Ihear yo u groani ng . but it is very simplemath. and in fact yo u had to learn it topass the Nov ice test. It's called thePower Ratio . Forget about logarithmsand focus on the business e nd of theequa ti on. the rece ived signa l. S ignalstrength is measured in S-points, whichyou can usually read directly from ameter on your rad io . Your concernwhen transmitting is how many S­poi nts you are generating at the rece iv­ing sta tion. The more. the better. right?Wrong. In the first place . if your signalis perfect ly copyablc at S-7. increasingthc strength to S-9 achieves absolu telynothing. except perhaps additionalpollution of me airways. And th is oneis ac tually e ngraved in stone. morc orless. in Section 3l3a of Part 97 (theFCC's rule s, for those who ha ve for­gotten): " A n amateur station must usethe minimu m transmitter power neces­sa ry to carry out the desired communi­cations:' That says two th ings. First, ifyou have a perfectly good QSO goi ngwith an $-7 signal, you are breakingthe law if you increase your power!

•

The effectivenessof QRP commu­nication. and me

QRP isn't muchof a handicap

have gone from strength to strength.Be lie ve it o r not. a few years from nowit will be apparent that in a scant twodecades, QR P has grown from be ing aspecial interest to become the life-bloodand mainstream of the entire hobby,

How can this be? Isn ' t working withQRP power levels a handicap? Not at all.It 's a somewhat arbitrary res trict ion ofthe one technical aspec t of radio that hasconsistently worked against the interestsof the hobby. Take away power. and yo u

arc left with skill.inventiveness. chal­lenge, and enthusi­asm, which are reI)'

similar to the at ­tractions of thehobby in its earli­est days. It all addsup to Fun with acapital r~ and atvery low cost.

Photo A. Under the hood of a modem 5W single-band CW QRPtransceiver-s-the Oak Hills Research OHR IOOA. built from a kit.10 73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

By defini tion. QRP is simplylow power operation. spec ifi ­cally with 5W of R F output or

less. In practice it is a large and grow­ing movement with in the ranks ofamateur radi o , a genuine avocation formost. and a way of life for many. At atime whe n the ham population as awhole has been declining. the Q RP fra­ternity has been growing exponent ia lly,QRP cl ubs are th riving. and thc sup­port indu stries. like ki t manufacturers .

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Proof of the pudding

math as we've just seen. But poweralso equals money, and when you starttalking kilowatts you are talking bigdollars. Not just for the linear amp, butthe antenna, transmission line, andtuner also have to be able to handle thejuice. Priced a IkW antenna tunerlately?

It's probably fair to say that mosthams realize how little benefit, rela­tively speaking, they will gain from in­vesting in a 1.5kW setup. But at thesame time, they have trouble comingto grips with the relati ve performanceof their garden variety l00W trans­ceiver as compared with, say, a 5WQRP transceiver.

The entry price for a 100W all-bandHF radio is real close to $1 ,000 now.You can buy or build a good QRPtransceiver for around $100. That, Isuspect, is a major factor in new hamsopting to go the QRP route.

It 's not in the eating - with QRP,it's in the achievements. Last weekenda friend o f mine cranked his "full gal­lon" 5W transceiver down to QRPPlevels-250mW output. He worked astation in PA, a distance of around 1,500miles from Denver, with one quarter ofone watt output. That works out to 4,(X)()miles per watt, and again it works bothways-all else being equal, yes, hecould indeed have worked a station inEastern Europe, 12,000 miles away, withone walt. We do it all the time!

Another friend has worked DXCC atQRP power level s, and is alreadywithin 10 countries of DXCC 2000.QRP Worked All States is a piece ofcake, and I would bet a higher percent­age of serious QRPers has done it thanthe HF cro wd as a whole .

Also on the local sce ne, the Colo­rado QRP Club stages two separateoperations for Field Day. One of them,the "Aloha site," is very laid back andcasual, affording new members andother interested parties an opportunityto get on the air, tryout their own ra­dios, and generally have fun with nopressure. The other Field Day operationis about as serious as you can get, withtowers, wire beams, a high altitudesite, and the best operators we can find.

Second, if a ll amateurs complied withthe regulation, then most amateur QSOswould be conducted at QRP powerlevels!

Don't believe me? OK, le t's look atthe power ratio in action. Say you aretransmitting with 5 watts and a stationgives you a report of S-5. Now doubleyour power to lOW and what happens?Your power output has inc reased by3dB and the received signal has in­creased by the same 3dB, which is ...wait for it ... one half of one S-point.Double your power again, to 20W, andthe received signal is now one wholeScpoint stronger. Double it again, to40W and we are at 1.5 S-points . Again,to 80W and we are at 2 S-points im­provement on our original 5W signal.80W is near enough to what your typi­cal " IOOW" transmitter put" out, andby now you should see what little dif­ference an additional 20W wouldmake. In summary, by goi ng from 5Wto 80W we have increased the receivedsignal strength by all of two Scpoints.The reverse is true-if you are copyingan 80W station at S-9 and he reducespower to 5W, you will still be copyinghim at S-7.

But let's not leave it there. Start atlOOW and add 3 dB at a time by dou­bling power- you go to 200, 400, 800,then an illegal 1.6kW [that's section313(b) if you' re counting]. We doubledpower 4 times, pick ing up 12dB or ...wait for it . .. 2 Scpoints . Talk about di ­minishing returns !~ut don't take my word for it-try it

on the air sometime and see what hap­pens . The only caveat is that the S­meters on most radios, if they arecalibrated at all, are set for the stan­da rd S-9 at 50~V input- at any otherinput, larger or smaller, they are noto­riously inaccurate. Personally, I thinkthere 's a lot to be said for honest re­porting the old-fashioned way- interms of perceived strength relative toother signals on the band-but that'sanother story for another time.

Money talks, and power walks

It is a generally accepted belief thatadding power is simply the least effec­tive thing you can do to improve yoursignal, and that 's supported by the

73 Amateur Radio Today. May 2000 11

sk ill incl uded), C W has an ISd B ad­vantage over SSB. If you read thepower rat io stu ff earlier, yo u can seethat 18dR is a HUGE difference ,That's about the he st r ca n do in term sof math , hecause u ltimate ly you arecomparing appl es with oranges. b UI

perhaps r can at leas t explain the se nseof it. A CW signa l is eithe r there or it isnot, and that 's someth ing the ear andbrai n can detect and work with ve ryeasily. SSB transm its the huma n voice ,whic h cons ist s of a w ide range of fre­

quenc ies and a wide range of ampli­tude or vo lume. T he resu lt is that thepo wer used to tran smit SSB is sp readout o ver a "bandwid th" of a cou p le

kH z. All of the power in a CW signal isconcentrated in a co up le of hertz. Andin SSB , the peak power is used o nly o nvoi ce peaks , which arc a ve ry sm allpercentage of the tran smitted signa l.So the 18dB figure is j ust ifiable , if notexac tly measu rab le (others will quotehigher or lower ligures, hut it's all rela­tive). In practice , espec ia lly when co n­ditions are marg inal. a 5 W CW signalwill work better tha n a lOOW SSH sig­na l. And again, yo u do n't ha ve to ta kemy word for it. If you've worked muchO X you kno w tha t often C W QSOsa re possible long before SSB "comesin" and so metimes SS B ne ver q uite

makes it. Even if yo u arc not a DXer,you sho uld be able to prove thi s to

yourself very easi ly in half an hour onthe air. If you arc a real Doubting Tho­mas, do a real test. Get Oil the ai r witha buddy using SSB, and reduce poweruntil you can no lo nger copy eachother. Switc h to C\V at the same powerlevel , and amaze yo urse lf at how m uchfarther you can reduce your outp ut andst ill com m unicate .

A s you m ight suspect, there is not alot of SSB QRP activ ity, hut there isso me, especia lly s ince we a rc experi­encing go od propagation o n 10 and15m, where there is next to no noiseand less power is needed . In fact, alarge n um ber o f long-time QRP CW

operators arc turning to QRP SSB asthe "next challenge."

There are two other important thingsabout Q RP eq uipme nt.

First, it lend s to be sma ll in s ize .ligh t. and capable of operation from asmall battery. This means it is a natura l

new gear comi ngout constant ly.

Q ual ity? Can ' t

beat it. Put you rSIOO home-bu iltradio ne xt to aS3 .o0 0 Ginz u boxand the Q RP rig

will dearly W in more ofte n than not.

Su rpri ses hell o ut of guys who have

just m ortgaged their XYL to buy thelatest all-singing-and-dancing bells andwhistles transce iver. But it shou ld n' t

be a surprise, because the bi ggest partof what you are paying for in the "big

rigs" is circuitry to m ake up for a frontend like a barn door. Your ty pical QRPtransceiver is thoroughly optimized for

operation o n a sing le band (or a fewbands) , CW o nly, and with very cffi­ciem signal processing from fron t-endto headpho nes. A good rule of thumb,which is proven by QRPers every day,is "i f you can bear him, you can workh im ." And we have better "ears" than

many of these guyswho can boi l water

on their Iincars .I said CW only,

there , d id n 't I?Thal's because CW

is at the heart o fQ RP-it's whatm akes QRP pos­s ib le as a hobby,and QRP becomesa very good j ust i­ficat ion for CWoThe reaso n goesback 10 the m ath,but pe rhaps notquite as directl y. Letme stale this as afact-all e lse be­ing equal (operator

QRP equipmen t can be very simp le ,hu t the fac t that we arc worki ng with

All t he good gear

lo wer po wer cir­

c uits means thatex peri m e nta t io nand in ve ntiveness

arc possible for allo f us. The QRPequipment ind us­lry is thriving, withseveral kit and ac ­cessory manufac­turers enthusiastic­ally support ed hythe marke t and

Photo n. The Colorado QR? Ctub s annual picnic features a"run f or the tree s" where members rake offfrom the pari/ion v;irhwhatever equipment they can carry, ami race /0 get a station 0 11

the air: The tottoon.titt workell.

The re sult last ye ar was fi rst p lace in2- A, the largest category in Field Day.Not o nly tha t. we p laced seventh overall.Only six out of" the thousands of" FieldDay stations did bcuc r-c-and we d id itwi th 5W,

My o wn in trod uc tio n to Q RP, withinthe first 6 mont hs of my ham career,came when a vis iting ham suggested Itum down the wid o n m y Fr- I0 IEand "re ally pu t my antenna to the test."r succeeded in working a station in the,US, from Austra lia, with half a watt.

Ph oto C. The Novice/tech station at CQC's /999 Field Dav madea hig contribunan to the cluh \ .\'IICCeSS , racking II p ol'er J50QSOs-all QRF~

12 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

Photo D. A QRP station capable of working the world will fi t ill abriefcase.

for porta ble operation. backpacking,and e ven bicycle mobile . Many of uslake a complete Hf rad io station withus when we travel. Incl ud ing a simplelightweigh t antenna . the whole kit andcabood le will li t in a briefcase . \...-i throom for a cha nge of underwear.

Second. a nd fina lly. QRP transmit­ters are very clean. Aga in. becau se weare dea ling with low power com po­nents. we have very effective filtrationof harmonics and other spurious crni s­sions. The result is that a QRP trans­mi tter is far less likely to causeinterference to nearby T Vs. ste reos.and te lephones. QRPcr.. arc right at thebleeding edge of ··..tcalth radio: ' manyof us living under rest ric tive ord i­nances and covenants that might causesomeone less ded icated to j ust give upon ham radio .

T he Q RP cultu re

A major fac to r in the continuedgrowth and success of QRP is the co­hcsiveness of the Q RP communi ty, Itis a comm unity in a ll se nses of theword. from local c lubs to nationa l or­ganiza tions. spec ia l on-a ir e vents . andabove a ll. an e nthusiasm for communi­cat ing with each other tha t has n 't beensee n in a ny other as pect o f ham rad iofo r half a ce ntury.

General radio clu bs arc droppi nglike fli es, hut QRP c lubs arc cropping

up like mush­rooms. T here areseveral organiza­tions with nationaland internationalme mbership. andloca l QRP clubsin a lmost everypart of the country.

A year or twoago I went to ameeting of a " ma­jor" old-fashionedmetropolitan ra­d io c1 uh. one thathas been in ex ist­ence since the1930s. They nowhave a total of120 mem bers . of which 9 attended themeeting. The program was on "laserpri nters: ' The last meeting of theColorado Q RP C lub was attended hy50 members. We had a station on thea ir. a nd a program re lated to actua lham rad io .

The Internet has been very im portant( 0 the growth of QRP. Just to g ive youan ind ication of how much is avai lableon the l-way, a searc h for " QRP" o nAlta Vista turned up 23,745 pagematches.

T here is a n Inte rne t "Re flecto r"ca lled QRP-L which has become themain universal com munications chan­ne l for QRPers. It's like a mail ing li st.

w here a subscriber submits a messagewhich i.. "reflected' to a ll other sub­sc ribers. A t the momen t there arcsome thing like 3.000 of them. from a llover the world . QRP-L is a very goodway to get "i nto" QRP. To subscribe.address a n E-mail message to [listserv@k high.ed u). The subjec t doesn 'tmatter, The te st o f the message sho uldhe SU BSC RIBE QRP-L yo ur_nameyo ur_c a ll.

Ano the r good resource on theInternet is the Colorado QRP C lub 'sWeh site. whic h yo u will lind at[www.cqc.org] . You might even think

Ccnrmued 011 too« 61

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73 Review,

Nl)moe, 14 on your Fl!edback card

•Steve Nowak KE8YN/41011 Peacock Ave. NE

Palm Bay FL 32907-1371

Exploring theKenwood TM-D700A

Part 1: Overview and installation.

Trying out new hardware can be fun. Trying out rea l1y neat new hardware can be alot of fun . Having the cha nce to ge t my hands on th e new TM-D700A radio fromKenwood has been more fun than I've had in a long time.

Photo A. The Kenwood TM-LJ700A comes complete wim mainunit. cont rol panel. MC-53lJM prog ramma hIe microphone withalphanumeric keys and ail necessary cables, brackets. and hard­ware. It even includes the cable fo r connection to a GPS receiver.

14 73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

I had seen the ads and knew that itwas a dual-hamler tha t could also

hand le A PRS , packet, H F SkyCom­mand"'" , and SSTV, hut unt il I got myhands on it. I didn't have a clue as 10

how many fea tures could he packedinto such a small box . The adverti se­ments for thi s radio have been under­stated. hut I guess there 's just so mucheven marketing e xperts ca n pack in to asingle ad . In fac t. this radio has somany features that its going to taketwo issues to tell you about a ll of them.

•TM-D700A

--,~-­_ ..._~-------------.-....-_.-

This month. I'll conce ntrate on thed ua l-band FM voice transcei ver and itsinstallat io n. Next time , I'll focus on itsability to functio n in advanced modesand capabi lities, incl ud ing pac ket,A PRS, and slow scan TV (SSTV ).

In my early days as a ham. the morefeatures a radio offered, the larger andheavier it became; the more ha m s,be lls, and whistles, the more kno bs,buttons, and gauges. In the case o f theTM-D700A, the physica l hardwaredocs not hint at everything this radio is

capable of. WhenI ope ned the box Ifou nd the actual ra-dio. a control panel,

the microphone andall of the cables,brac kets, and thehardware needed toinstall it (Photo A).Wi th the e xcep­tion of the se pa­rate control pane l.there was nothi ngthat eve n hintedat how much Iwou ld he ab le todo wi th the TM ­m OOA.

T he matn unit measures 5.5 1" x1.57" x 7.6~ " and weig hs abo ut 2.6Ibs.- fairly typica l for a modern tran s­ceiver. It has two modular connectorson the fron t. one for the microphon eand the othe r for the cable that COI1­

nccts to the control panel. The re is aD8-9 soc ket to permit the connec tionto the se ria l port of a com puter, and amini phone jack whic h can he con­ncctcd 10 a G lobal Posi tioni ng Sate llite(G PS) rece iver. T here is also a o-pinD IN connector for connection to anexternal TNC or video . On the back ofthe rig arc the SO-239 co nnector forthe ante nna , the power cable . and two

jacks for speakers . There is a mounti ngbracket included fo r mobile installa­lion. and rubber feet if it w ill be usedin a fixed locution .

T he contro l pa nel is about the size ofa handic-ralkic , measur ing about 5" x2" x I" a nd weighing just over 6o unces. It has three knobs. a dozenbuttons, and an LCD display. O nly thepower button has a label. It a lso comeswith a uniq ue swive ling mountingbracke t into w hich the contro l pane lcan he slid or removed eas ily. The mi ­crophone has four function buttons,the D'TMf -typc push-buttons, and , o f

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scientific test, and there 's not a lotou can tell by doing that, it's a time­onored ritual every ham has to com­lete with every new rig. Once I wasonvinced that it was working, I begano explore what it could do and how itould do it.The large knob at the bottom left of

the control panel could be used to con­trol the VFO or, when in memory mode,o change memorized channels. Thewo knobs on the right each contro lledolume with the inner knob and the

squelch level with the outer collar. Byressing the left knob, the left di splay

became larger, indicating tha t it wouldbe transmitting when I pressed thepush-to-talk button, and I could switcho the frequency displayed on the right

by pressing the right knob. It is veryonvenient to be able to switch bands

and/or frequencies in such an intuitivemanner. In fact, the more I learnedabout this rig, the more I was struck byhow logical all the controls worked. Itwas time to read the manual and planthe installation of this rig into my car.

Mobile installation

Usually the biggest problem with amobile installation is the need to find aocation that is safe and convenient,

and doesn' t require that you be a con­ortionist to implement. With the TM­

D700A, there are options not availablefor most units . The main radio unit hasa mount that lends itself to being lo­cated in a number of out-of-the-waylocations . It can be trunk-mounted, forexample, e ither on the floor of thetrunk behind the rear scat or under theshelf beneath the rear window. I haveseen some installations in vans whichused the space under the driver's seat,so I decided that I would mount themain unit under my car seat so that themicrophone was accessible throughthe gap between the driver 's side of thebench and the passenger 's side. Gener­ally, if I can mount a radio out of sight,it makes me feel more secure, and thisnot only hid the main radio unit, butalso I could luck the microphone underthe armrest to hide it.

The control panel can be mountedvirt ually anywhere that is convenie nt. Itoyed with locating it above the rear

course, the push-to-talk button. Nothing alooked too intimidating, so I dec ided to ycharge ahead. h

I admit that I picked up the manual , pbut fortunately Kenwood has a "Quick eStart" section for those of us who tend 1to run short on patience when we've egot a new toy. I connected the micro-phone, control panel, and main unit to-gether, added an antenna, and connectedit to my power supply, The control 1panel lit up with a welcome message and 1then switched to a display thai indicated v2 meter FM on the left and 440 MHzon the right. The orange backlit screen pwas pleasant to look at, and each of thebuttons now had a label on the LCDscreen to explain its function. The fre-quency display is large and very easy Ito read; the function labels a littlesmaller, but still very plain. The con- etrast (which is adjustable) is excellenton this display, which is importantsince, as I would find out, thcre is a lotof information this will provide . Natu-rally, I immediately tuned it to my fa-verite local repeater to try it out just tomake sure it worked. While this is not

Frequency Range (MHz)

VHF 144-1 48I

UHF 438-450

Receive Range (MHz) 1

BandA 136-200

118-136

300-400

400-470

Band B 400-524

136-175

800-1300

Power Requirements

Rece ive 1.0 A or less

Transmit (max) 11 .5A or less

Trans mitte r Power Output

Low Approx. 5 W

Medium Approx. 10 W

H;gh (VHF) SOW

H;gh (UHF) 35W

Table 1. TM·D 700A specifications.

Continued on page 61

radio and perhaps the tower frequencyfor the local airport. You can lock theseout so they arc not scanned, but can beaccessed manually when needed.

Incidentally. there is now a softwareprogram that is available on the Inter­net either thro ugh the Kenwood Websi te or [ftp:llftp .kenwood.net ] whichwill allow you to load all of thememory functions from your computerinto the TM-D700A. T his can be donewith any Windows 95 or 98 systemand a standard DB9 cable. The pro­gram is curre ntly in beta test, so by thetime you read this, it should be well es­tab lished. With this program. you canset up di fferent configurations for trav­eling for each city where you mightexpect to operate, and load these ti leseasily and conveniently.

Now that I had a few of the basicsout of the way. I dec ided to sit downand thumb thro ugh the manual. It wasthen that I realized that I had not ye teven scratched the surface of what thisradio could do. Ac tually. there are twomanuals. one covering regular commu­nications and one addressing specializedcommunicat ions. Both manuals areavai lab le on -line at [ftp:/Iftp.kenwood.net]. so you can read up on all the de­tai ls of the radio if yo u arc so incli ned .

One key hit of advice included in themanual is that if you tend to throwmanuals out with the packing material- DON' T, Although this radio is verylogical and almost intuitive, you"Il findout that you need to refer to the manualon occasion, especially since there arcmany features you will be growinginto. The FTP site has PDF copies forall current Kenwood radios. Not onlydoes this allow you to read up on aproduct before buying it. but you'l l neverhave to buy a spare or replacementmanual aga in!

The basie features arc laid out infront of the operator in such a manneras to make operati ng a joy. Designateone frequency as your "Call" fre­quency and you can jump to that fre­quency with a sing le press of a buttonon the front panel or the microphone.The same can be done to switch be­tween memory and the VFO.There aresix buttons along the bottom of the

to look at a specificpolicy to cover youramateur gear.

With the dual­band capabi lity,Kenwood gave ap­propriate thoughtto connec tions.There is an inter­nal speaker on themain unit intowhich the audiofrom both bandsis fed. When in­stalled in a remotelocation. such asin the trunk, anexternal speaker is

obviously required. Kenwood has madeit possible to use the internal speaker,one or two ex ternal speakers. or acombination of internal and externalspeakers. If you ru n voice communica­tions on both bands. you will have dif­feren t requi rements than someone whooperates voice on one band while usingthe other for digita l comm unications.

After I was sat isfied with the insta l­lation, I began to program in the localrepeater frequencies . There are 200memory locations. so I was able toprogram in the local 2 meter and 440repeaters. common simplex frequen­c ies. and key digita l frequencies aswell as repeaters in areas where Imight travel. When I have the memorycapacity availab le, I tend to group fre­quencies so I can follow my own logiclater on . For example, I might uscmemory locations 1- 20 for local 2 meterrepeaters. 21-40 for local 440 MH z,4 1-60 for areas I visit, etc . In this way,I can overwrite out-of-area memorieswhen necessary. With 200 memories,this is easily done. In fact. the radio isset up so that each of these blocks of20 frequencies comprises a gro up andyou can choose to monitor any indi­vidual group. To make it more co nve­nient, memories can be stored withlabels so you immediately know keydeta ils about the frequency. If youtravel a lot, for example. the ability toindicate a city and a code such as "W'·for a Skywarn repeater, "A" for ARESIRACES, etc . is very helpful. I abo liketo store a fe w frequencies for receive­only, such as the local NOAA weather

Photo 8, The control panel's fight weight allows it to be mountedalmost anywhere. It is easily removable to discourage would-bethieves.

view mirro r or on an open sec tion ofdash board to the left of the steeringwheel. r fi nally settled on mounting itto the right of the whee l where it isreadily vis ible except when the gear­shifL lever is in reverse. Since I try toavoid complex radio operatio ns whiledriving. and especia lly while dri vingin reverse. this seemed an app ropriateloca tion. I affixed the unique con trolhead bracket to the dashboard and ad­justed the angle of the display to ensureadequate visibility (Photo B).

If you prefer to install the main radioin the trunk or other remote location.Ken wood has cable ex tens ions avail­ah le to make this e~sy . To avoid confu­sion. all three modular plugs arc con­figured differently. The microphone usesan 8-pi n connec tor. and the intercon­necting cab le uses 6 pi ns at the mainunit end and 4 pins at the control panelend. In any case . with this design . themain unit can be placed in a hidden lo­cation and the control panel can be rc­moved when the vehicle is unattended.The contro l pane l can easily he slippedinto a briefcase. purse , or large pocket.Since Kenwood has made no secret ofthe fact that they do not se ll replace­rnen t contro l panels. they have donetheir part to frustra te would-be radiothieves. Incidentall y. adding a new rigto your car is an exce llent time to re­view your insurance to make sure yourradio is covered in the event of theft ordamage. Many standa rd automobilepolicies do not cove r ham radio equip­ment. so you may find it advantageous16 73 Amateur Radio Today. May 2000

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It has buih-in frequency counter, i"n - this genuine MFJ custom carryingCad charger CIrCUIt, battery saver, low cas e. Has back pocket with sccu-buttery warning and smooth reduction rity cover for carrying dip coils,drive tuning. adaptors and accessories. •

Super easy to use! Just set the . Ma de of special foam-filledbandswitch and tune the dial-- just like .fa.bnc, the MFJ-29C,~ushlOns

)'our transceiver: SWR and Complex Callyour fa vorite MFJ-259B blows , deflects scrap~s , and protects knobs ,d' · I 'd" lvt d I . 52599 5 meters and displays Irom harm.Impedance ar,e ISp aJe ",...rant y . eo er for your wear it around your waist, over your

Here s w hat YOU ca n do best pricet shoulder, or clip it onto the tower while vouFind your ~ntenna'strue ~esonant fre- MFJ-259B is a complete ham radio test station work -- the fulfy-adjusrahle webbed-fabric car-

quency. Trim dipolesand verticals. . I di fi t RF ' I tying strap has snap hooks on both ends.Adjust your Yagi, quad, loop andother me u mg -- requencr coun er, signa gen- H" ~ clear protective window for frequen-., crater, SWR Analyzer M, RF Resistance and "., ... '- ...

antennas, change antenna spacing and height and Reactance Analyzer, Coax Analyzer, Capacitance cy display and cutouts for knobs and connec-watch SWR, resistance and reactance change and Inductance Meter and much more. tors so you can usc your MFJ SWR Analyzer'instantly, You'll know.exactly what to do by Call or write for free Manual without taking it out of your case. Look/ orsimply watching the disp lay. the ,HFJ logo for genuine authenticity!

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_ Take the guesswork out of build109 and metal cabinet is a compact 4x2x6'/. inches. MHz in presence of strong RF fields.adjusting matching networks and baluns. How good is the MF.I-259B? Has virtually no effect on measure-

Accurately measure distance to a short or :\-IF,I SWR Anatyzers'" work so good. ments. Works with all SWR Ana lyzers.open in a fallerS coax . Measure length of a roll many antenna manufacturers use them in their MFJ N. MI ni tyof coax, coax loss, velocity factor and impedance. lab and on the production line _+ saving thou- o . atte.r W rat warran.

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Measure signal strength detect feedlinc faults, track down hldde:n transmit- I\IF.J E;\:T E R PR ISE S, Il'lC.over 60 dB range, check and set FM devi- tns, tune transmilters and filters _Plug m scop.e 10. ME:JBox 494, Miss. State, MS 39762ation, mea,ure antenna gain, beamwidth, analyze modulalio.n wave fonns, measure.a~dlO dls- (60 I) 323-5869; 8-4:30 CST, l.1 on.-hi.fro nt-to-back ratio. sidclohes, feedline _loss tortlon, noise and mstantaneous peak dev!atlon. FAX: \60 I) 323-6551 ; Add s/hin dB. Plot fie ld strength patterns, p OSI- Covers 143.5 to .148.5 MHz_Headphone J ~ck , ?at- . .. Tech I e1p : (60 1) 323+0549tlon antennas, measure preamp gam, tery eheck function. Uses 9V battery. 4)(2 1,)(6 I. m. Pm es and '>'C"lfi , . " ,m, <ub)"," to chang• . (0) iW~ Mf'J £nt," pn " " i",

More hams use 111F.I SWR Analyzers"J thall allY others ill the world!

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Build and CompareLearn about receivers from these two simple designs.

Number I' on your Feedbtlck urd

There are many excellen t sources of information on HF receiver design available inbooks, periodicals, Web pages, and amateur radio's vibran l oral trudltion (ta les ofquestionable provenance ). While th e books occupying the several feet of shelfspace I have devoted to this topic have been read cover-to-cover any number oftimes, nothing drives home a concept like th e success or failure of experimentation.These nvo receivers are born in part from this desire to experiment, mixed with thefun of construction and the pride of using home-brew equipment.

The two radios meet different • Must li t on a single 3" x 5" sing le- to seleet re latively closely-spaced sta-needs. The 3 1 meter broadcast sided PC board suitable for mounting tions (whereats spacing is tyically 5 kHz

band is my workbench compan- in my favorite kind of enclosure. on 3 1 meters).

ion. where I regularly listen to a vari - . • Shou ld be a simple mechan ical31 meier design

ety of programming from Radio Canada design-no critical parts placement.International. BBC. Deutsche Welle. few contro ls. My mechanical ability is F ig. 1 is the 3 1 meter block diagram.and Radio Netherlands while the sol- generally limited to drilling holes. and Figs. 2 and 3 the schematic.dering iron is hot. One radio is dedi- • Shou ld have mi nimal dynamiccatcd to this. The other is an auxiliary range requirements. Unlike 40 meters.

I 1unit used to look for 20 meter activit y where broadcasters and amateurs in- 31 Meter Parts List

while " the real radio't-c-my Drake terming Ie with widely diffe rent signal I NE602A double IR8-is busy doing something else. strengths. 3 1 meters is broadcast only. IUl balanced Philipslike receiving slow-scan. while 20 mete rs is amateur only. mixer/oscillatorI ;

Desirable features and funct ionality The 20 meter rig has a few more IU2LM1 458 dual op

,

requirements common to both include: stringent req uirements: Nationalamp I• Must use readily available or easily • Must he stable enough to receive

!U3, U4MC1 350 IFmade parts. preferably ones already on CW and SSB . Motorolaamplifier

hand. • Must have enough tuning resolution

T1455 kHz IF Toko 7MC-interstage xtmr 452252NO

IT2 455 kHz IF r oko 7LC-

-6 db .... - 14 d\l .1010 ")5db ·9 db .,,,, N, ."" output xfmr 352713NQ9 5 MH~ MUI ' 455 P"' ~ Enw~eF.,~,

) - ~~F,h. r-, r:~t eol:'- r-, 455 kHz

Toke HCFM2-A"A ' C Fl1 ceramic filter. 6 Iy% % '; ~..>-'1] 4558

I <:y - -- ~ t->_it_ •

V kHz bandwidth

"".s: G•• 1 ~H adjustableToko

" L1-L3 8TKXNS·G. on inductor

T1050Z

~"" Lo~ .1

MVAM 108

:;Y OHillalO' 01 .02 varactor tuning MotorolaTun~S diodes

Fig. 1. 31m receiver block diagram. Table 1. 31m pans list.18 73 Amateur RadiO Today • May 2000

I .. .._- I I• • ,I .,""' ".-... :A I• .~ ..,.. .. ! .....I1j ,....., •

I 1O· I - ,...-'oor:1"''''' ' .,

I r ~ ~ 1)41

-..oT I ~ ,.- i t ' OIl "" Ill) , .' • ,1' "i' '-" , '" _ 'Il:' • N '- ;.=:' \

~ i i\ ! -;;~ · '100tl~, r"Vf ,~t

, .j~ ~ T" '"...,~ =l{:t .... , "' .. :..J ' " "'.._"..~_, 0 ' '"'' 0 <01 0 . '.6 "', " ""'llOF' " ••f, ......... ' I . "' W ..._,- - . :. ,.... a .~ 'H'.- 00, ...", "

0

(ow

1ml'., ,. ..._-

"._- , ''110""", _, • '"1tO .. ",, _,,~ 0 000 ' " =l ~, (lf tO~~.. , go I:;:Q1 ,-,-ooe:: ,~_ ~. S'o'·..... ·ooeo

I '~ ~" j t.-.J H -,.;/!,;~_ '. ---+--• • •.- J." I 1. oro pe'I I l' .~ (0 t.'ll 1)1 no~- -

~ '"T• ! ;0;

•t "" 070 ... .. ~ , I.. ' . I

, l( l '~ ,.......- n Xl , r--~ :___. " ,.-l-~::- 0 ' __ _~ -• 0 ..1...... '.

J~ _ 'V'

"" '~c::r.. ....."" .. ... .. ' I · '. I J,;]r • . 5 ;~_..

6 ";' l'S:I' r h i!Jjli'(lJ., O,OC/I obtT ......,

".f, . 1\0.' ·'00.... 0 (104.· -1-..,l-.Af '.'i'" !'V •.~ 0021 ",-

~ • ~

v t oo,!11m

." '...... 1 1I

...Fig. 1. 3JIII receiver local oscillator and mixer. Fig. 3. 31", receiver IF and audio sections.

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Contin ued on page 20

First IF amplifier U2 drives a c rystalti ller through T3. T4 couples thefil tcrs outpu t to second IF stage U3.The gain of both stages is cont ro lledby a Sk pote nt iometer. U3 's high OUI­

put impedance is transformed by Tn, asta ndard 10.7 MHl IF transformertuned up s lightly 10 10.9 .\1Hz. nearerto son for input to double-balancedmixer modu le U4. A crys tal -contro lled

mixer VI. d rive n differe ntially throughthe secondary of T2. T he local osc illa­tor c ircuit is much sim ple r in this rc­ccivcr, rel ying: 0 11 a transistor interna lto U I. The 30k lO-tum poremiomctcravailable when this unit was built a l­lows for sufficie nt varacto r luningvoltage variati on without the need foran amp lifi er, QI is a n optional bufferamplifie r used to iso late the local os·c..illutcr from an external frequencyd isplay I occasionally usc .

Common-gate RF amplifier~ over­comes the loss of the RF bandpass li l­tc r to feed the RF input to mixe r V I.Local oscillator QI, buffered by Q2 andQ3. supplies V I with the loca l oscilla­lor signal. T he luning voltage for theIWO vuractors in Q I 's lank is genera tedby one half (If U2. which amplifies therather small voltage change developedacross the 1000. 10-Hl m tuning pot .

RF and LO signa ls are conve rted byV I to ~55 kl lz. and coupled throu ghTl to U3 . the firs t IF amplifier. whosegai n varies up to a ma ximum of about35 dB accordi ng 10 the IF GA IN con­rrol setting . The output of V3 passesthrough the n-kl-lz-widc ti ller to U4 ,the second IF ampli fi er, Tran sform erT2 coup les the IF signal to the low im­pedance of envelope detector D3. intum driv ing audio stage U5 throughthe volume control.

Eight "A A" ba tteries provide 12 Vpower. Ufl produces +6.2 V regu latedfor the loca l osc illator itse lf. the loca losci llator tuning amplifier. a nd themixer. Current drain is about 60 mA ata reasonable audio leve l.

20 meter design

The an tenna is coupled through atwo-reson ator presclcc tor network to

When in Seattle vis it us at :Radio De pot. Sui te 176. 5963 Corson Ave .. So. Seunlc. WA 98108

Phone (206) 763·2936 Pax (206 ) 763·41 72

73 Amateur Radio Today · May2000 19

1-10 MH.

I'''oto ~\. Jim receiver:

On 20 meters , a narrower band widththan could he had with c heap ceramicfille rs was needed, and images wou ldhave been more of a prob lem. so acrystal filte r was buill. The major con­cern here was find ing three crysta lssuitable for the filter and the BFO . T hefilter is slightly tunable by varying thesurrounding capacitors. and the BFOmay be tuned by pulling the crysta lwith the 20- J25 pF trimmer. Both tun­ing ranges arc small, though. and in­deed. qu ite a few crystal s were triedbefore the magic combination wasfou nd.

Coils and transformers

oscillator (sec Note 1) provides about0.5 Vrrns to U4 \ local osci llator port.

The 51n resistor at U4's output porti... requi red tn pro vide a reasonablematch both at audio frequenc ies and atthe 21. 8 ~IHL image freque ncy. Thetwo sections of US provide audio gainand audio bandpass filtering (see Notes2 and 3 ). U6 provides fi nal aud iopowcr gam.

Design decisions:Demodula tor

I would have pre ferred a sync hro­no us detector for the AM rec'civcr. billin the in te rest of simplicity. I chose tostay wi th the e nve lope detector. whi chis quite adequate . For the 20m re­ce iver. I chose the double-balanced di­ode mixer rather tha n a Gilbert-ce llentire ly bec-ausc I wanted to build a rc­cciver using a hybrid OB),1 in this role .

A nother NF..602A could have been usedhere , as I have done in subseque ntdes igns.

Overall ga in

There are no IF inrcrs tage transform­e rs in the 3 1 mete r rece iver. a nd as aresult. lower overa ll ga in because ofincreased loss incurred by impeda ncemis matc hes around the ceram ic filter.Thi s is e ntire ly outwe ig hed by thelarge signa l stre ng th of broadcaststations.

IF sect ion

T he " keep it simple" mantraweighed most heavi ly on the 3 1 me terdesig n. w here I felt having images inthe input tun ing range was a minorprice to pay for using c heap. commer­cia lly-a vai lable coi ls and filters for455 kHz.

The 20 me ier recei ver does indeedhave six home-made coils: two so le­no ids and four toroids. The three toroidssurrounding the IF section allowed agood matc h into and out of the c rysta lfi lter, and a llow the mixer and both IFamplifiers to run balanced. These areused for widcband impedance match­ing: The impedance rati os arc some­what importan t. but the y are notfreque ncy-determi ning components.Toroid tra nsformer T5. which couplesthe BFO to the product detector, is panof a tuned circuit. but is only a fre­quency determining component in thatthe crvsta l must oscillate at its funda­mental ra ther than a harmonic .

Lessons learned

Bu ildi ng and comparing these radi osgives an appreciation for why the lit­erature stresses certai n characteristicsat both the archi tectural and detai led

-:Q]

+3] db+10 db-7 db·10 10 +35 db-10 db

1091853 MHzCrystal fi lter

~'[ 1~8t-l

+35 db-6 db +1 7 db

14-1 435MHz

-- - -

LocalOSCillator

3003-3433MHz

IF Gam"'" Xl ,1

BFO10 MHz

•Tuning

Pi/:. -I. 20m receiver Mod:. diagram.

20 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

RepeatersOD your Ireq tuned, plug & play

em, 2m & 440.• S399.95 & 5499.95

Rweater ControllersRC-IOOOV 5259.95

Micro Computer Concem8349 G•• Teee An

!\tw Po rt Ricll t y, n . .J.46SJ

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bltp:llh omt 1 .~lt.attlUIk/mtt

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20 Meter Parts List

"'b.OI·"­I!!ROn • • 0 • " '. """,I."O_,~ , • • , 9' Q",_~. ...-. U · ·· '9..1L.-·"'l~ , • • p' '"• • ....., i.9 ·iOH~. . ... i.Q • • •• '0 t"........ ~fAI., g '10. ..., . 0 . 19 . 11 ' .'9. "'!-4 .0 ._Go ', IllR..-. 2<1 . to • ... ""

a svc.o. Ie> I 024x7&a><250

a R_ HogII R. __~ ",",1<lAA._CR-wl. GOES. _ __ s . 1&U U , _ HF f ....

(J R, .... rs.-',.0000oI'''''. 114 ' ,_ F__ ._ ...-SIpt--

'"""" '" ..~ s,...-Q 11'11...... 101_ 111", .....50_,.. o~tv '28~, M"1IloFAA PrDgrt"""- s. ... Ii1.R_ r Ju il $.24Y'

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quircments affords greater leeway indesign than would be appropriate fo rthe radio, wh ich must be all th ings toall people all the time , Here are someof the lessons learned :

1. Images . While a 455 kHz first IFis clearly an inv ita tion for imageswhe n covering I MHz of RF, it's notthe only concern. The A~l rece ivercould have used a crystal fi lle r, too­with two crysta ls, the response doesn 'tseem overly sharp.

2. Coi ls. Winding the home-madecoils was not such an awful chore . Thetoroids arc se lf-shie ld ing (provided theleeds arc kept short), and can be woundto whatever configura tion is needed interms of taps, number o f windings, andimpedance transformation.

3. Demodulator; Receivers using onlyone hybrid diode mixer should U''iC it as thefirs t mixer rather than squander its ex­cellent characteristics as a demodulator.

4. Loca l oscillator. The NE602A's in­ternal osci llator functioned quite we ll. Itwas sufficiently stable for SSB recep­tion on 20 me ters , a nd reduced thecomponent count considerably overthe separate osc illator/buffer used on3 1 meters, whe re the .sta bil ity require­ments of AM are more lax anyway!

5. Mechanical. IF gain is su ffic ie ntin both receivers to be problema tic .Even though this is not a constructionarticle. those oft-repeated tips aboutRF mecha nical layout cannot be over­emphasized. in particular:

a. Place bypass capac itors close tothe chip.

h. Avoid sockets.c . Surround the chip wi th as much

Philips

Mini Circuits

Motorola

Home-made

Home-made

National

National

Home-made

Toke 154AC·470072NO

Your choice

TakaBTKANS­9439HM

NE602A double

U' balancedmixer/oscillator

U2. MCl 3S0 gainU3 con trolled AF amp

sat-t doubleU4 balanced diode

mixer

US LM1458 dual opamp

UO LM386 audio amp

Toroida l xfmr: 85T1 j.lH primary, 4 5 j.lH

secondary

Solenoidal xfmr:12 0.82 j.lH primary,

1:1 turns ratio

Toroida l xfmr: 185

T3 j.lH center-tappedprimary, 20 j.lHsecondary

Toroidal xfmr: 86T4 j.lH primary, 150 j.lH

' econda<y

10.7 MHz xtmr: 4.3TO j.lH primary, 7:1

tums ratio

l1 10 j.lH adjustablecoil

10.91685 MHzcrystalS. Other

xt , closely matchedX2 crystals between

10.5 MHz and 11MHz may be used.

Photo H. 20m receiver:

circuit leve ls. At the same time. itshows how na rrowing the range of re-

'fable 2. 20m parts list,

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 21

o.

Leaguc. Newington cr.2. Low-pass first stage: Application

note A N-20, Linear ApplicationsHandbook, I99-t , National Scmicon­ductor Corporation, Santa Clara CA.

3. High-pass second stage: RudolphH. Graf Encyclopedia of ElectronicCircuits, Vo lume I . 1985, Tab Books.p.296. ~

j).

These two radios offered a testbed for AI1Ulteurs, 1993. American Radio Relay

Fig. 5. 20m receiver mixer and I Sf If:

experimentation and comparison. fromwhich l leamed much. And it's amazinghow much more I now appreciate a shel ffull of receiver design hooks!

Notes

I . A table of suitable va lues for this os..c illator for frequencies between 3.3 and26 MHz is provided on pages 30- 11 and30- 12 of The ARRL Handbookfor Radio

PC board grou nd foi l as possible.d. Wh ile toroid transformers arc self..

shie ldi ng. the leads arc not. so keepthem short. Keep .IS much gro und foi lbe neath solenoidal transformers asposs ib le . co nnecting to the shield to

ground, to minimile magnetic couplingbetwee n IF transformers.

6. Aud io gain . Too much audio gaincan be a bad thing . Power supp lydecoupling is more difficult at lo w au ­di o frequencies than at RF. Make surethe lo w frequenc y response o f the audiostagets) (determi ned by coupling capaci­tors and filter components) is no t to olow. M o torbo ating- -or even worse ,

subaudiblc oscillat ions that propagate toother stages-ccan result.

7. RF amplifier; Isn't reeded at these Ire­q UCfK.; !.'S us ing an :,\Eti02 from end. I ex­p..-rimeracd by removing ~ from the 31meter rig and conrectiug the tap, its base,directly to pin I of the mixer ; with no ditfer­ercc in selectivity or image rejection. Theother radi o feeds the ~f":602 differen­tially. and this d ocs seem worth the effort,

• ~ hse,.• ..> Coils Commercial

> • " solenoidal..J.

•-.'~ ' ~t].rs- .) a, '" l• . 'O"tO "

L,

tJ§ "). '1

-'"'••

'"'jP"~

Signa l type

Demodulator

Inputfrequency

IOvera ll ga in

IF filter

31 MeterReceiver

AM

Diodeenvelopedetector

9- 10 MHz

93 dB

Ceramic

CW/SSB

Doublebalanceddiode mixe rproductdetector

14,0-14.35MH'

104 dB

Home­madecrystal

Home­madetoroids;commercialand home­madesolenoids

~

I~ ,J.';I

•

t--j~.. , "- • -, •. .I~ CO; ,--It.2 lJ'S • 1t.2 U5 ,

"t .. •,..--! . LM 1~ LM~

••• LM14S!l> •

I•.. .. . -

' -4--' = - · "I~•• • t... ..:. • • • •r ,~

IF

Localoscillatorfrequency

1st m ixerImagefrequency

455 kHz

9.455­10.455MHz, highside

9.91- 10.91MH'

10 .9 18MH,

3.083­3.433 MHz,low side

7.485­7.835 MHz

Fig. 6. 20m receiver 2nd If; product detector. and audio section.22 73 Amateur RadiO Today · May 2000

Table 3. Summa ry ofkeyfeatures.

73 ReviewNumber 23 on YOlll' FHdtNlcll card

Dick Schneider ABQCD4464 E. Bails Place

Denver CO 80222[AB0 CD @ARRL.NET]

QRP with the OHR 500Missed ali t on building an HIV-9? Here s the next best thing.

The pathway to my cur rent Extra Class license has a iiuge gap in it. As an avid SIVLerand wan nabe ham, I suspen ded opera t ions in 1961, without an amateur license, inorder to chase girls, run track, score touclldoWIlS, pursue academics (yes, I was aile ofthose), and genera lly be a big man on camp us. That was high school. Theil camecoll ege, tile '68 conven tion , in vestigative journalism, and kids, lots of them . AboUl 34yea rs later, when the youngest offour ch il dren was safely on ,1 path toward highschool graduation, I bough t my self a nice shortwave r ecei ver. Tbineen months later , Ihad the Extra ticket and found myself Oil a dead r un in the m idst of ham ra dio, as ifthose three decades plus lied never transpired.

Photo A . Prewound tomids ~ri th labels.

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 23

.. ;.

The transmitter

The rig is rated to kick ou t a fu ll gal­Ion of QRP power: -1-- 5 watts on 80.

Research, fou nded in M ichigan byDoug De.Maw W IFB, develo ped fur­ther by Did Wei tzkc KE8KL. the de­signer of the O HR 500. The companyis now owned by Colorado 's ownMarshall Emm :-';1 FNNK5F:\, of Mile­stone Technologies. Inc .. more we llknow n as Morse Express. Some of theO ak Hills history incl udes a num ber ofsing le- band rigs. the dual-hand OHRQ RP C lassic . the -t-band O HR -1-00.and now the 5·band OHR 500.

.... ..... or _~.- ..- ­- ,.-" ..., - , ..- r '~ •::::::: ::- ::: "l_c_...... or ,.. I '\

-t::: :~: 'r ::; IlfI" 'ilq" ~__= ~_ I ­_ .( t" ~ l<:..~ . . ..__..._ ..:_

-~ ------ tf1' ---- ••-.-..,t., l~===~----. ---------.... ------ , ":::: ~=c:: == ,Q'f Lli.,.. \ \

8. or 9. I've used them and owned them.just by trad ing in the used gear marke t,but I was never ab le to build one of myown and then put it on the a ir.

However, I ha ve found thc next bestthing - the OH R 500 from Oak HillsResearch - a five-band CW rig thatj us t about makes you think you' ve puttogether yo ur own HW-9. Other thanthe nostalg ia value . the O HR 500 of­fers superior performance to even thestock HW· 9. a lthough it incl udes onlyone of the WARC hands - 30 meters.the key one. if you"Il excuse the pu n.The only other WARC band I' m inter­ested in is 17 me ters. for the OX, hutbelie ve me , the lad of that band is atiny price to payfor such a te rrificrad io. And a ra­d io you get tobuild yourse lf. putyour name 0 11, anduse to start rack­ing up rag-chews,contest scores . orDX contacts.

The OHR 500is the natural evo­lut ion of fi nelycrafted ki t rigsfrom Oak Hills

B ut I had. in fact. missed a fewthi ngs. Like several solar cycles,

some so hot that you didn 't even haveto tum the rig on to work Fiji - or sosome hams have claimed.

I also missed the entire Heathkit era.Totally. I had bu ilt a Knight ki t re­ceiver way back whe n, hut had ne verset any Heathkit parts a fl ame with asoldering iron.

When t returned to ham radio in 1995.I im mediately fe ll under the question­able inllucnce of a growing crowd ofham radio radicals - QRPcrs. I neverwent Q RO. and haven ' t regretted it onehit. For one th ing, I found that the Q RPcrowd was busy bui ld ing their ownrigs. There were even kits availab le.My first rig was an Oak Hills ResearchSprint for -1-0 meters, purchased usedoff the Internet. I boug ht an MFJ tunerand some magnet wi re from RadioShack. A key, a set of earphones, and abattery, and I was on the air. Boy. wasit fun.

hom there, I bought and sold a llsorts of used rigs - to catch up onthose lost years - and then startedbuildi ng rigs.

What I truly mi ssed was the chanceto build anyone of Heat hkit's ground­breaking QRP rigs. the "ho t water" 7.

24 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

Before taking inventory of the parts.I checked to sec what sort of too ls OakHi lls Research recommended for theO HR 500. All that's required are thebasics : long-nosed pliers . a regular setof pliers. a good wi re stripper. a me­d ium Phill ips screwdriver. a .062-inc hAllen wrench. a smaller hammer. a25- 30 watt penc il soldering iron. aruler. a magnifying glass. and a magnify­ing light. You' ll also need a frequencycoun ter that can read up to 30 ~tHI.

signals, a digital vo ltmeter, and a sta ­tion transceiver for a lignm ent. T he kitcomes with a plastic tweaking tool toadjust trimcaps and trirnpo ts.

T he man ua l suggests that adcsoldcring bulb and braid are " use fulto have ." Well. " use ful" is an under­state ment. I'd say havi ng some fresh ,high-quality dcsoldcring braid a vail ­able is essentia l. I heated up a lot onthis project Don't get your desoldcringbra id at your local Radio Shack, unlessthe re is no o ther way. There 's no tell­ing how long the stuff has hung on therack. and there is a strong like lihoodthat the tlux has dried out. I' m luckyeno ug h to have the old TechAmericasto re , now called RadioShack.com (es­se ntially a Radio Shack sto re on ste ­roids), \'... ith in walking d istance . Theycarry good. fresh deso ldering braid . Socheck with your local electronic sup­ply store or order some high-qualitydesoldcring braid over the Interne t. Ialso keep a flux pen handy to wipeonto a litt lc strip of desoldcring braidj ust be fore I use it. A lso , once youhave de soldered. clip o fT the braid sec­tion [hat contai ns the o ld solder. plus

circuit docs a fi ne job of equa lizing thesigna ls across the band. Thi s feature isespecia lly helpful during contests, whensignal stre ng th is all over the place .The AF gain and RF gain ca n he se th igh to captu re weak signals. but yourcars aren ' t pierced when you tune by a30 over 9 signa l. A nd for the pileups.congested contes t band segme nts. andmanaging QRM. the RIT lets you movethe recei ve signa l plus or minus I kHL.O utput jacks on the bad. of the rigprovide options for headphones and anexternal speaker.

Constr uction preparation

the sidctone ge n­e rator to matchperfectly just howyou want it tosound. Both ofthese adjustmentsare inside on oneo f the ci rc u itboards.

The receiver

The recei ver isa si ng le superhetdesign with an RFpreamp, a TU F-I

diode ring mixer, a se lec table AGCcircui t wit h a manual RF gain con­trol. a fou r-pole crystal ladde r filter.and a se lecta ble four-pole audi o filter.The VFO. which utilizes an air-vari­able capac itor (you old-timers shouldreme mber what that is) , covers 150kHz on each band . T he funny noisesthat e manate from the rece ive r arcsweet. melodic . and easy to copy, Thesuperhet does a terrific job of sup­pressing e ve rythi ng but the signa l youwant to hear. Eve n the fai ntest C W sig­na l is readable above the noise floor.which already has proven ideal forQRP contests when I am trying to digout those barel y audible signa ls - sig­nals, inc identall y, which I cannot hearon my TS-570 because its fron t end isso broad, and it is so noisy. This ubilityto dig the weakest signal out of theno ise is one aspec t of the O H R 500that reminds me a bit of a Collins 75 ­53 I once owned. While I admi t the

compa rison mightbe pushing it abit . I can honestlysay that the differ­ence betwee n thetwo is only slight.

For e xception­ally noisy band con­d itions. the four­pole audio filterdocs kick the- ,

~:i5::, - le ve l of the C Wsignal up consid­erably by filte ringout some of theQRN on eitherside of the signa l.A lso , the AGC

•

Photo B. The OUR 500.

40. 3D, and 20 meters and 3 watts on15 meters. \Vhat it does is give you upto 7-8 watts on 80, 5-6 watts on 40. asolid 5 watts on 30 and 20. and the ad­vertised 3 watts on 15. O ne thing weQ RPers love is the abili ty to easilycontrol power output. The O HR 500places the power output control rightwhere I want it - on the front panel- gi ving me conti nuous power selli ngcontro l from zero to maximum output.\\lith my matching Oak Hill s WM-Iwattmeter, r can quick ly adjust mypower to Q RPp le ve ls. Coupled withthe front-mounted Tunc/Operate toggleswitch. I can rapid ly adj ust powe r outwhe n I switch hands. So if I want tooperate in a contes t. for example. at250 111W or 950 IIIW for those powermultip liers. I have no trou ble rescu ingthe output when 15 meters goes deadand I jump to 20 mete rs.

The QSK is smoot h. And you ca nadjust both the vo lume and the tone of

I'-----'=.._ _ ~l:-;-'---:~--;---:-~~,":,-,Photo C. The completed boards, readyfor chassis assembly. Top:T/R board. B0110m left: Receiver board. Bottom right: Oscillatorboard.

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diagrams for each board, and a valu­able , well-illustrated full page on howto wind the toroids.

Construct ion

I also like to get the toroids out ofthe way early, so I read ahead in themanual. sorted out all the cores andwires, and started windi ng. I usuallycut the wire an inch or so longer thanwhat is specified in the instruc tions.There are quite a few toroids to windin the OHR 500. but I follow an ap­proach suggested by fellow ColoradoQRP Club member Jim Pope KG0pP.who wraps toroids while watchingte levision. and doesn't worry too muchabout the winding count until later. Ido the same now. and it works quitewell. It 's a great thing to do whilewatching a football game or someother fonn of enjoyment via the tube. Iusually count the turns in groups offive. I'll place several Objects nearby- coins, a se t ofkeys, a pencil. r-' --.J

e tc. - and eachtime I fini sh fiveturns, I set oneobject into a littlepile on the couch.If it's a 27-turntoroid. I quit afterI have fi ve objectsin the pile, thenadd two turns andlabe l the toroidwith masking tape.I recount the turnsunder a magnify­ing glass. It makeslife easier. Thefin gers get a littlesore, though.

The three primmcircuit boards thatcome with the kitare double-sidedwith plated-throughholes - very solidThey include anoscillator board,receiver board, andthe TIR board,which I assembledin that same Of­

der. Assembly is

another half-inch. The heat probablyevaporated the flux in that ex tra half­inch. By cutting it ofT, your next desol­dering move will be at peak efficiency.

Oak Hills recommends using rosincore solde r with 60:40 tin:lead contentfor the kit. That's what I used. andnothing fell ofT the board afterward.

I start any project with a parts inven­tory. Every builder seems to have hisor her own approach to this. One ap­preach is to identify and label the partsand stick them all into Styrofoam. An­other is to lay the parts out, side-by­side , place a long piece of maskingtape over them. then label the part onthe masking tape. I' ve used variationson these approaches. What I often donow is to separate the parts by type andplace them in plastic trays . These canbe the trays that come with built-incompartments , the plastic trays thatmicrowave dinners arrive in (washthem out firs t. though). or the plasticlids to pi nt comainers. Then I take themost annoying parts piles - the res is­tors and capacitors - and sort themout by their values, arrange themneatly on the workbench and thenplace masking tape ac ross their leads.Then I label them, and tape them upsomewhere. There were no parts miss­ing from the OHR 500 kit. And for thefew times I thought I had a m issi ngpart, the culpri t appeared after anothersearch.

The manual

There are several nice fea tures of­fered by the OHR 500 manual.

The instructions use a tradi tionalstep-by-step approach to construction,limiting you to stuffing no more than ahalf-dozen parts before you apply sol­de r. A little bracket lets you check offeach step as you proceed. Just like myold Knight kit, and just like those fineHeathkits I never got to build.

The appendix includes a usefu l partspictorial. so you can easily figure outwhat some of the parts look like. You 'llalso find good illustrations showinghow the chassis and case are assembled,and where all the contro ls, switches ,pots, and jacks go. Also included is adetailed boanI-by-board parts list, a c0m­

prehensive schematic, parts overlay73 Amateur Radio Today - May 2000 25

Photo D, Mowl/ing the fin ished hoards inside the box.

Photo E. \V,rillg ill the T/R board on the bottom ofthe chassis.26 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

O n the a ir

Contin ued on page 5 1

Well , not for me . Back when I wasadjusting the transmitter for maxim umpower out. I sim ply wasn't getting it. Ia lso wa sn ' t hearing a nything . Afterabout a day 's worth o f troubleshoot­ing . I packed up the rig , e nc losed aeheck for $75, and se nt it off to theformer Oak Hills owner, Dick Weitzkc.who a lig ns the rigs under contract withthe new owner of the company. D icklaid hands on my OHR 500 and sent ithack with a nice litt le note . r hadmessed up the two transformers, and

he found" so lder bridge. Things likethis happe n, and I wasn' t 100 bum medabout it O nly th ree boo-boos o ut of somany possibil ities.

A nd then - RA.\ I! - vou're o n the•

air!

u fe w other tu ning adj ustment s foreac h band .

In the next step. you adjust a pair o ftrimcups fo r eac h hand to obtain max i­mum power our. This is where I ran intotro ublc . I'll cover this a little fu rtheron.

In the fi nal alig nment steps , youconnect an antenna, tune in a C W sig­nal. and the n adj us t o ne trimcep so youarc hearing a 600-700 Hz to ne ­make sure you arc on the high side o fthe CW signal. Then, using your sta­tion transceive r, set the transmi t offse t.

Finally, you adjus t the p itch a ndvolume of the sidctone .

I p laced the O HR 500 o n the air d ur­ing a Monday night Spartan Sprintsponsored by the Ad venture Rad io So­ciety. I knew there 'd be p lenty ofQRPcrs me ssi ng around on a fewbands to help out.

We ll , o ne th ing I no ticed was that itseemed as though I was not gellingheard too we ll. I'd call and call a ndca ll at the full five watts and eet noth-

•ing bac k. I was n' t too used to this.eve n at QRPp power le vel s. I di d man­age to work Ed W E6W in Californiaand Doc K0 EVZ in North Dakota . ButI had the nagg ing feeling that I wasn ' tright on frequency. That same evening,

\

One of thetrickies t parts o fthe project is whenyou do the chassisassembly. Whatyou have is threefully populated cir­cuit boards withseeming ly a mil­lion color codedwires stick ing o utof them. We ll, thecolor-coding isthe key, a longwi th a litt le pa-tience . The sturdy

chassis desig n makes this work fa irlysimp le. What you are doing in th isstage is connecting the c ircui t boardsto each other and to a ll the contro lsand jacks mounted o n the fro nt andrear of the rig .

Alignment

O nce the c hassis is assem bled anda ll wired up, it's time fo r the firstsmoke test and then alignment.

The alignment procedures di rect yo u10 set the co ntrols a certain way, andswitch the rig to 15 meters. When yo uapply powe r to the rig for the firs ttime , you should get a red LED on thefron t panel , and no smoke. A t leas tthat' s what happened to me . Knock o nwood.

Nex t. I attached m y Q RP wattmeterto the ante nna connecto r and screwedo n the Col orado Q RP Club '5 kit -builtd ummy load o nto thc o utput connecto ron the back of the wattmeter. Then Iattached my frequency counte r to test

po int number 2o n the osci ll atorhoard . I have aRad io S hack fre­quency counter.and a ll I do is uscalligator clip leadsto connect thecounter to the testpoint.

Then it 's j ust amancr of adjust­ing a trimcap fo reach band to reada spec ifi c fre­q uency. There are

in the relevant installation step. Thebook does take you by the handthrough the project quite nicely. I justfollowed the steps, inserting a fewcomponents in to their re spective holes.turni ng the board ove r. so ldering. a ndthen checking the so lder joints with amag nifier.

Oak Hi lls recomme nds taking yourlime with this project and I agree . Youcould bu ild the rig in a long weekend.but you wou ldn ' t wanI to go to worko n Monday morni ng . Wel l. not thatyou wa nt to go anyway. But you' dwant 10 "not go" eve n more . I loggedmy time on this project. a nd fou nd thatit took me about 6 ho urs to bui ld theoscillator board. 5 ho urs for the re­ce iver board . 10 hours on the T/Rhoard , 4 hours for chassis asse mbly,and 1.5 hours for alig nme nt. Add tothat abo ut 3 hours for to roids. and Icome up with 29.5 ho urs fo r the to ta lconstruction projec t. Let ' s ca ll it a neve n 30 hours .

Dan Metzger K8JWR6960 Streamview Dr.Lambertville MI 48144-9758[dmetzger@monroe.lib.mi.usl

Read All About It!Part 3 ofgood sluffftVIIl The Hertzian Herald.

Here 's all you ever needed - or certa inly wanted - to knolV about "Computers >­

Wilat 's going on in th ere?" Pius your added ball us this m on th : "ZOO i: A brainodyssey. :

How do computers d isplay daz­z ling video-ga me graphics,create 3-0 views of a house

from l10 0r and e levation plans, or heatyou at chess? What's going on in there?

Actua lly, a computer is j ust a ma­chine for switching se ts o f voltages he­tween 0 V and +4 V states . (We callthem hinary 0 and I statcs .) Any intel­li gence a computer appears to have isdue to it" incredible speed. and to thecleverness of the programmers. who areable to as s ig n human meaning s tointricate patterns of these hinary dig its .

How fast is a typical 300 MHz com­puter? Imagine a store clerk who takes60 years to calculate your change ifyou give him a $20 bill for a $12.39purchase . That's about how s low a hu­man see ms when compared to a com­puter. Such speed means, fo r example.that a compute r can beat you at chessby checking all possible scenarios (mostof which a human would considergrossly foo lish) for ten moves ahead.T his amounts to about ten b ill io n

Reprinted with permission from TileHertzian Herald. newslcncr of theMonroe County (MI) Radio Communi­cations Association (MCRCA).

scenarios, but check ing the m all andc hoos ing the one that leads to a vic­tory takes only a few minutes for acomputer.

How ca n stri ngs of binary Os and I shave any meaning in human terms?Actually, there are three basic ways.(We call the m data types.) The d ig itscan represent memory address numbers.computer instruction codes. or user da ta.Let 's look a t memory addresses first.(Wc ' H get to the o thers latcr. )

Early 8-bit microprocesso rs . used inthe Apple II. C ommodore Pet, a ndTRS-80 computers . h..td an address busconsisting of 16 lines. and a data busconsist ing of 8 lines. Such processo rsare sti ll qu ite common in automobile s.microwa ve ovens. and se wing ma­c hines, to name a fe w e xamples. Let ussay that the 16 addre ss lines fro m theprocessor go to 16 corresponding lineson an IC memory chip.

The lines are numbered AO throughA IS . Line AO represents a count ofONE if it is at +4 V, or Z ERO if it is ato V. Line A I represents a group of 2cou nts at +4 V, or zero at 0 V. A2 is fora group of 4. and A3 is for a group of8. Continuing thi s doubling for eachhigher line. then if Al 5 is +4 V it rep­resents a g roup of 32.768. All possible

counts from 0 to 65.535 can he repre­se nted by various I and 0 states ofthese 16 binary lines. J ust for fu n. secif you can find out what numbe r is rep­resented by 000 1 0 100 10 100000. Cit 'sa fa miliar number ; answer appearslater.)

W hat (he processor spe nds most ofits life do ing is plac ing 16 hinary d igi tson its address bus. which call s up one

o f the 65.536 locations in (he memory.The memory then responds by placi ng8 binary dig its on its data bus. se nd ingthis stored data hack to the processor.

Every now and then . the processorse nds data TO memory. or it reads datafrom some input device, or it sendsdata to some output device. But mostlythe processor sends a l fi-bit address tomemory and the memory responds byse nding 8 hits of data to the processor;then the processor ca lls for the ne xtbyte o f data at the ne xt seque ntia lmemory address.

The compute r is set up to treat thefi rst byte o f a program as an instruc­tion or Op Code. T he various I and ()bits of the " P code tri gge r va riouslog ic circ uits in the computer. Here a resome common operations that may heimpleme nted :

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 27

28 73 Amateur Radio tcasv » May 2000

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CODE CODE

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F806 81 CMPA Finishedletter "z"?

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F808 2. BNE No (branchnot equal)

F809 F8 back8 Send anotherletter

F80A 27 BEQ Yes (branchif equal)

FBOB FE back2 Han righthere

Table 1. Sample prugram segmelll.

- the next byte IS the data. This iscalled immediate addressing, becausethe data follows immediately after theop code.

Sometimes no address needs to begiven for the data to be operated onbecause the data IS a lready in thecomputer's accumulator. Clear Accu-mulator or Increment Accumulato r aree xamples. T his is called inherent ad-dressing, beca use the instruc tion is in -he rent ly complete in one byte . Thefo llowing byte is the next instruction .

- So, the bits on the data bus can rep-resent op codes. addresses. or data .

, You must understand that there isnoth ing about the bits themselves thatd ist inguishes them as instructions. opcodes, o r data; it is their relative posi-tion in the program that determines howthey will be inte rpreted. For example.

• Add two 8-bit numbers (or subtractthem).

• Clear the bits in the accumulator(the computer's main sto rage register)to zero .

• Inc reme nt (add I to) o r decrement(subtract I from) the accumulator.

• Shift the hits in the accumulatorone place le ft. multiplying the numberby 2.

• Shift the bits right. e ffec tive ly di-viding the number by 2.

• Complement the bits - I s becomeOs and Os become Is .

• Load the accumulator with 8 bitsfrom a specified memory address.

• Store the 8 bits from the accumula­tor to a specified memory address.

In addi tion to te lling the computerwhat operation to perform. the op-codebits te ll the data type of the next byte(or several bytes). Fo r instance. the opcode may te ll the computer to load itsaccumulato r from address 101 0 I 0 10.ooסס1111 The program byte fo llow­ing the op code would be 10101010(h igh hal f of address) and the next bytewould be ooסס1111 (low half of ad­dress). It would take three successivebytes in program memory to completethat instruction - the first having thedata type OJ..l CODE and the next twohaving data type address. The fourthbyte would then be the op code for thenext instruction .

The above instruction is in absoluteaddressi ng mode (Motorola calls it ex­tended addressing) because it tells inabsolute terms (wi thout reference toanythi ng else ) what addre ss the com­puter is going to operate on. There is anaddressing mode called relative wherethe address bytes tell the computerhow far ahead or back to jump relati veto the address it is al ready at. There isanother mode. sometimes called regi s­tcr indirect, in which the address isheld in a separate 16-bit reg ister in thecomputer. which has been preloadedby another instruction. The exact addressing mode of each instruction, andhence the data types of the followingprogram bytes, are determined by thebits of the op code.

Sometimes the op code te lls thecomputer that the nex t byte is not anaddress where the data is (0 be fou nd,•

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I'a~ TV and s..'II' Ui lll'~ralll hl in R 2000 has lall"51cable and satelli te fixes. sch..'rn;llu.:s. bullet bloc kers.cubes. etc, I'a~' TV Seri "" \ ',,1. 1-10 (300 pages)$59.95. lI addul: Salellilll' T V Video $29.95,!\Iolllhly ~t"" sll·lt e r Sub-.c li l' l inli with weh acct;'ss.U .t.95, EU l)lhilll: lis1ed ah", II' S99,95 rchooee hardcopy or CD-ROM l Find An~nn", ,'\ n~.... hll'~ : l'sillgIll", Inl"'"lrl. S<oarcll puhlic and peo ate dalaha.'C'1O [0~e1 inform:u:ioo 011 anyone. S59.95, Ca13Iol! S I.OO.

A striking feature o f the brain com­pared to a computer is its ab ility tohand le analog data in the presence o fdea fening backgro und no ise . For ex ­ample . m ost o f us could pick Mom'sface out of the 30 fac es in her eig hth­grade grad uation photo. A computerwould be do ing well to co unt the num ­ber o f faces correctly. and probabl ycouldn' t tell which were bo ys andwhich were girls. The overwhe lmi ngsuperiori ty o f the bra in in thi s area.a nd the eq ua lly impress ive superiorityof the com puters in mathematical andtextua l ma nipulations, suggests thutth ese tw o device s may he opera ting infu ndame ntally d iffere nt ways,

The big: q uestio n is, W hat are com­pute rs capable o f doi ng . and what C.1n

the y not do? But com puters just ma­n ipu late binary hits : I M Hz or -1-00MH z. 8 at a time or 32 at a time. that' sall they can do . The question is thusbcncr phrased. Wha t can a com puterprogra m he wri tten to do'? Th is makesit clear th at the answe r to the fi rstq uestio n depends o n the program me rs- hu m ans - more th an it depends onthe com pute r hardware .

A com puter docs not haw - andthere is no rea son to suppose that itwill ever acq uire - a will or a se nse o fpurpose . A com puter wil l execute aprogram 10 trigger a c harge that willb low it to Hade s wi th the same indif­fe rence th at it will calculate the sq uareroo t o f six . Computers do o nly whatwe humans prog ram them to do . Th us.it may be wi sest to fra me the questionas. What do we wa nt to ha ve our com­puters do? This makes it clear that theanswe r (0 a ll three que st io ns - andthe respo nsibi lity - rests wi th us. fa

2001: A brain odvssev• •

Xext year will be 2001. Are tal king ,th inking, plo tting com puters like HALin the mo vie 2001 j ust over the ho ri­zo n? I don' t thi nk so . If you ha ve bee nfo llowing our disc ussion , you knowthat computers functio n hy m anipu lat­ing binary hits. and that meaning: is as­sig ned to those b its by programme rs .T he instructions are thi ngs like Load,Incre ment. Bra nc h If Equa l. and Add .Pentium-le vel co mpute rs wo rk on 32h its at a t ime rather than 8. and theyhave multip ly and d ivide instructions.which some people find impre ssive ­hut there arc no instruc tions like "seeka nd de stroy e nemy a lie ns : '

Fu turists often asse rt or imply thatwhen the num ber o f b its in a co mputermemory reaches the number o f ce lls ina hum an brain . the computer w ill be­g in to thi nk like a huma n brain. Com ­paring the co mputer to a bra in seemsreasonable at firs t becau se they bothha ve the ability to sto re and proce ss in­fo rm ation. Ho we ver, th is is rather likeco mparing meteo rites to bulldozersbecause they both mak e big hole s inth e ground . The question is notwhether a computer is like a bra in. hu twhether a hrain is a t a ll like a com­pu ter. Ha ving desig ned the m. we knoweverythi ng about com puters . We knowalmost noth ing about the bra in.

It was o nce tho ught that the brainwas a b inary device : a neuron e itherfi red or rema ined inactive . It no w ap- 1--- - - - - - - - - - - - - - ­pears that neurons fire in d ifferentways at differe nt time s. and that the

• •

d iffe re nce s may reflect d iffe rent info r-mationa l content. T hu s we are unab leto say tha t the bruin is like a co mpute re ven in the ele mentary classifi cat ion asd ig ita l or a na log . The other q uestionswe ask when comparing computers aretotally meaningless when applied tothe bra in: What' s the word length?What's the clock cycle time'! Is there asig ned-n umber d ivide instruction?Ho w many primary acc umulators?

world programs tend to be 10 kilo­bytes to 10 megaby tes long , hut the ylook exactly like o ur tiny one. Thi s isj us t an example to g ive you a feci forco mputer programs , but if yo u ha veq uestions, write o r E-mai l me .

Lhe Motorola 6800 microprocessorwill interpret the same byte (say. 10010 110) as instruction Lo ad Accumula-lor if it appears first in the program. asLow Half o f Address ooסס 0000 100 10 110 if it appears as the second byteafter the Load instru,..-tion. and as UserData if it appears a t the speci fied ad-dress to load from. ooסס ooסס 10010 110.

The computer itsel f makes no at-

tempt to interpret user data ; that is upto the progra mmer. For example. if theprogram mer sends data 1001 01 10 to aprinter thai uses ASCII (A mericanStandard Code for Information Inter-change). the data will denote a capita lleiter V. If the programmer has beenusing that data by te to count partsloaded into a box. it w ill denote 150parts . If the programmer is checkingsecurity on a buildi ng with g doors.data 1001 0 110 will indicate that -1- o fthe doors are open (Os) a nd 4 areclosed ( Is ).

Now, le t' s loo k at a typica l programsegm ent (Ta b le 1) for a 6800 micro-processor. To avoid a co nfusi ng b liz-lard of Is and Os. the b inary is con-vened to hex (hexadecim al): Each he xcharacter represents four bi nary d igit s.as sho wn in Table 2 .

The source code. on the right. is whatthe programmer wri tes. The object code ,on the le ft. is what the computer ex-ccu tes. A " host" com puter automati-ca lly translates the source code to objectcode. FE and F8 are " two's comple-mcm" for -8 a nd -2, respectively. Anyd igital hook fro m the library will tellyou abo ut it.

O ur p rogram is 12 bytes long . Rea l-

Hex Binary Hex Binary II 0 ooסס 8 1000 II t 0001 9 1001

2 00 10 A 1010

3 00 11 B 1011

I 4 0100 C 1100

5 0101 D 1101 Il 6 0 11 0 E 11 10

I' 7 0111 F 1111( . ,

'fable 2. Hillary to hex conversion.73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 29

,

73 Review

Wattmeter Winner73 reviews LDG 's DWM-4 digital wattmeter kit.

Jeff M. Gold AC4HF1751 Dry Creek Rd.

Cookeville TN 38501

This is a microprocessor-controlled unit Ihal covers the HF (1.8 10 5~ MHz, up 10 15011'.11 IS), VHF (HO 10 160. up 10 150 wa rts) and UHF (~20 10 ~70. up 10 150 lI'atls)bands. [[ uses a sys lem approach 10 rnoruror both power output and SWR [or up 10[ou r rigs in any com bina tions ot bands. Til e sysleIll consists ot' a main unit I\'irh tli emicroprocessor, and then a sensor unit that hangs off each rig you wan l to monitor.

I be lieve that LOG has OIH.'C aga income up with a winning kit. The: de­

sig n for thi s d igital wat tme ter wasfi rst published ill a Ju ly ]499 QST ar­ticle . a nd the new LOG kit is busedo n that design . My ..ystcm ha ... thema in unit. one sensor fur HE and nnefor VHF.

T he d isplay unit has a 2-l1 y- 16hack Iit LC D module . Th is d isplayprovides you with infor ma tion aboutthe RF that the remote ...c nsors arcsampli ng. Us ing the d i...p lay a nd theMen u and Select push-buuon... a llowsyou In contro l which se nsor mo nitorswhich hand and whether you want thedi sp lay to he a bar gra ph or numeric

P!lOlt1 A. Fro"' I,h'1I'.

30 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

o utput. You can loo k at the forwardand reverse po we r a nd the SW R si­mul tancrHIS ly.

T he DW~1 -4 ca n operate \vith fromII to 15 VDC at mi n imum of 75 rnA ,The correct power plug is provided\..-ith the kit. The manual states that anySO-o hm cable can be used In connectthe rem ote sensor 10 your antenna sys­rem . SO-:!J9 connec tors <I re used inthe hack of the sensors for cable con­ncctions. You may need an adapter forthe :! me ter module if you arc usingBl'\C connectors.

The kit is at the very top of my lis tw ith rcgnrd 10 quality or parts. Thehoard is a work of art, It is very clearly

silk-screened andthe parts holes a rcin the exact loca­tion so that whenyou place the punon the hoard. itfits perfectly'. Thehoard is plated­through and :">0 1­

dcr-maskcd. Theso lder maski ng isalso at the verytop of my list forbeine well thouahto 0

out. The solder

pads arc very sma ll . hut allo w e asy sol­dering. Th is so lder masking makes itvery hard to end up with a so lder bridge .The ma nua l i, a lso very we ll done . It isd ear and easy to follow. There arc step­by-step instructions. and you check nileach step as you complete it. Themanua l has you install parts hy ho wfa r they stand off the hoard . I realtyli ke th is approach . It makes it mucheas ie r to get the parts l1at agains t thehoard and have the project look nicewhen you have completed it.

I would rank thi s kit as cas)' ttl huild .T here arc no t all that many pan s. Theboa rd is not very densely pack ed. andthe sil k-screen and directions arc bothclear. T he parts come in separate pack­ages. I fou nd no need to separate outresistors and suc h before buildingThere arc o nly a few values or eac h.

You will need ( 0 usc an ohm meterfor the resis tors . The re sisto rs arc 1/8watt and that makes it very hard to

check the color code at mv ace eve n• O '

w ith my mag ni fying g lasses o n. It isalso eas ier to lake a n extra minute toc hec k ruther than have to dcsoldcrparts later.

T here is no e xterna l wiring. Thej acks solder right onto the hoard.There arc prebuilt ribbon connectors to

Photo C. Sensor kit.

the Hf at either high or low po wer o ut-

I put le vels.T he A lann thre sho ld allows you to

r se lec t the S W R readi ng at which the

r ye llow LED comes on. T here is also aseparate Re lay thresho ld. This controlsan in ternal re lay that can take thepower (Jut o f line if the SWR goes pasta set point. You can also set whetheryou want the relay to au tomatica llyreset o r manually reset.

There is also bui lt-in error checking.One type of error readi ng w ill come upif the fo rward ma xi m um powe r le ve lis exceeded . A sec o nd erro r is di s-p layed if the reve rse maxim um

COlllinued 011 p age 53

I Specifications jIBoard s ize 3.5 x 4 .0 inches I

Enclosure 6.0 x 4.0 x 2.0inches

ISensor s ize4.0 x 2.0 x 1.5inches

Sensor connections 80·239

I HF power ranges 15, 150 watts

VHFIUHF power range 150 watts

Power requirement 11 10 14 vo ltsDC,75mA

Meas ures peak or average

I Bar or numeric readout ILEO and relay variable alarm system,

1:1 to 30:1

I Buitt-in error-ehecking softwareupgradable

I Kit builds in 2 to 3 hours average I, .. " ft

Table I. Specifications.

the H F senso r.You would thinkthad leamed mylesson. No indica­tio n it was work­ing until I read theinstructions andadj usted the unit'sbalancing capaci­tor. A ll in a ll, e v­erything workedlOO<;f as designed.firs t time up.

Calibration of the main uni t invo lvesusing a known 100 watt o utput signaand a I : I d umm y load. T here arc twovariable resistors for each of the foupossible sensor positions . You feed i100 wa tts forward and adj us t the digi ­tal output to re ad 100 watts. Nex t youreverse the mini -stereo jack leads anddo the same thi ng for the re verse read­ing. The manual suggests borrowing avery exact meter and using it for refer­ence. I plan o n doing th is very soon.

T he func tions of the me ter arc acccs­si hle by using the men u a nd selectpush-buttons. There are a total ofseven me nu s. When po wered up. theunit d isp lays the model of the kit andthe software versio n and then goes tothe main me nu .

Pushing the menu button cyclesthrough the seven me nu c ho ices. andthe se lect button is used to se lec t ind i­vid ua l menu options. This is int uitivea nd it should o nly take a couple ofminute s to gel th ings set up to yourpreferences. Pressing the se lec t butto ncycles through the fo ur channels andthen to A.

The A is fo rautomatic opera­tion. In this mode.the di splay auto­matically switchesto the channel thatis c urre ntly se ns­ing forward power;If two channelsboth have forwardpo wer, the small­e st channel num­her gel'> priori ty.You can ha ve ei­ther bar or nu­me r ic reado ut.Yo u also ca n set

connect the di sp lay and the controls.Even the switch and push-b unons pluginto a board, a nd you j us t so lder the m

to the board after they are ins talled inthe case . This also makes the kit m uc heasier to build . and saves a time at theend of the project. There is one toroidto wind for the HF se nsor. The LCDboard c omes pre-assembled . I wi ll re­peat the fac t that th is is a very easy kitto build successfully.

The kit went toge ther in about 2- 3ho urs as advertised. I ha ve to admit Inever clock building a kit. There wereabso lutely no surprises. The kit wenttogether easi ly and was a pleasu re tobuild.

The instructions have yo u build yoursensors before poweri ng o n the mai nunit. I ended up taking a break be·tween the mai n unit and the two sen­sors. I like to know that what I havebuilt works correctly before goi ng onto other steps. I connected 12 vo lts tothe main unit and turned the po werswitch on. I expected some lig hts andsuch to stan fla shing or some other in·dicatio n that there was life in the unit.No smo ke, hut no visible me ans of de­term ining whether the projec t was upand runni ng .

Next. I took drastic measures. Ipulled o ut the manual and actua llyread it. Righ t there in plai n sig ht, instraight Engli sh , it said I needed to ad­

j us t R25 on the main board to get theLCD leve l correct. About another 15seconds later. the unit was doi ng ev­erythi ng it was supposed to at th ispoint. The same th ing happe ned with

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 31

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ON THE [nUER

Revenge of the Hams

Number 33 011 your Feedback card

As our restructured hamdom now sets out to do contin ued battle for survival and growth inthe e-business of the New Economy, it's sometimes easy to forget that the in tels, Ciscos, andMicrosoits of the aigitel wortd have not been the only sources of technological i nnovation andapplication d uring the past f ew decades.

Photo A. Kenwood's Great Grandf ather and Grear Grandson.

MUch to our benefit, a number of hammanufacturers have not been slow in

embracing the new technologies in waysthat are as striking as they are revolution­ary, and it is these types of advances thatwill help us most in attrac ting new mem­bers to the ham ranks. So our 73 hat is offnot just 10 the Alin co-Hamtronics-Icom­Kachina-Kenwood-Ml-J-Yaesu tcchie pio­neers, hut al so to the ma ny small andmedium-size ham manufacturers who arealso keeping up with the computer Joncscsand then some.

On th is month ' s co ver. sup pl ied byKenwood, we see a good example of justhow far things have come - and how hamtechnology continues to progress.

A lthough the T S-520S dates back to1975, yo u will still hear many of them onthe air today - a sure tribute to a versatiledesign. Designed when digital displays werenot available on HF rigs, this is a rock-solidrig whose optional VFO for spli t operationmakes it a favorite of contesrors.

Still, Great Grandfather 520 pales in com­parison to Great Grandson 570, Kenwood 'snewTS~5 70D(G) transceiver. This state-of­the-art rig features 16-bi t Aft-stage DSP, theNR I noise reduction system, TX audioshaping, CW autotune, large LCD display,46 types of menu features, heavy-duty trans­mitte r section, a bank of 100 memories, PCcontrol option, and - of course - much,much more. Ready to transmit on the 160­10 meter ama teur bands and recei ve at 50{)kHz to 30 MHz, the TS-570D(G) mea­sures a scant 1O-5/8"W x 3-3/4"H x 10­11 /16"D, mak ing it idea l for shack, car,RV, or boat.

Why not visi t your favorite ham manu­facturer or dealer today~ in person or oth­e rw ise - and part wi th some o f yourhard -earned New Economy cash? Keep

active or get acti ve agai n wi th a new rig,and don' t forget to show off its techno-

logical whizbangs to the kids dow n theblock. Fa

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 33

Whither Ham Radio

The 21st Century

Okay, I' ve been talk ing about ham radiocirca the 1990s. Bu t now we've got to facethe reality of the Internet, some thing we ' vebeen avoiding. Now we have rigs such as theKachina, which can easily be adapted to be

It 's about time 10 co me 10 grips with there ality of amateur radio today, something Ihaven' t seen recognized by the ARRL or, forthat matter, in any of the ham club newsletters.Or CQ, etc.

W hen I got involved with amateur radio ,back in the mid- 1930s, the hobby was influx . T he battle over spark (Spark Forever!)had just ended, with spark being made illegal.The first commercially made receivers fromNational Radio and Hallicrafters had instantlysto pped hams from building their own re­ceivers, bu t we still had to build our trans­m itters. Most of our transmitters were ultra­s imple: a crystal osci llator and an amplifiertube. Aro und 95% of all ham communica­t ions were via CW, with a handful of Class Aops in the 100 kHz phone segments on 75 and20m. Cla ss B phone ops were almost totall yon 160m, as 10m was an as yet unexploredVHF band .

Then came WWII and fou r years of QRT,followed by IOns of US Army war surplus.(And almost no Navy surplus, since the Navyroutinely destroyed their used and unneedednew eq uipment. When a bunch of new con­struction contracts for submarines were can­celed right afte r the war I watched millionsof dollars of fabulous radi o, radar, sonar, andfine test eq uipment which had been set asidefor the boats being crushed at New Lo ndon.)Most of the surplus was easily converted forham use . T his was soon foll owed by com­mercially made ham transmitters, effective lystopping 95% of us from having to buildanyth ing. The day of th e " Appliance Opera ­tor" had arrived. And, for all practical pur­poses, the need for eve n the slightest under­standing of electricity or electron ics. Most ofus bought a transceiver, an antenna, and talked.

I got involved more for the fun of buildingequipmen t than operating. I bu ilt hi -fl ampli­fiers, an all -band kilowatt rig, a completeRITY system, an d so on. I spent years at myworkbench building and converting surplus.I was the first ham in New York City on 6m,I DXed on 2m from the top of Thc DailyNews building, and so on. When SS B camealong, I quickly bu ill an SSB rig.

Then, in 1965 , when I sa w that transistorshad essentially ended the era of ham building, Iheld an auction and got rid of several truck­loads of parts, tubes, and surplus equipment.And that was the end of my build ing.

Today there are so few hams building equ ip­ment of any kind that getting art icl es for 73on sim ple projects is nearing the impossible .Sure, hams like to read about co nstruction,but that's ha m fiction for most of us.

The re ali ty of hammi ng today is that, as 1said, we buy everything, pl ug it in, and ta lk.

Fro m that po int of view, the ARRL's re­cent defe nse o f the Morse Code j ust showshow totall y out of touch with reality the guysyou've elected as directors were.

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roundtable fig hting with each other for ourbusiness. The membership went to nearlytwo hundred in a year.

If you want your ham club to be fun andgrow, you 've got to have exciting meet ings,and that means interesting speakers. It alsomeans keeping almost all of the club busi­ness within the ex ecutive committee, wi th avery brief committee report at the regularmeetings. It means getting meetings goingon time and starting' em with your speake r.

I' ve addressed hundreds of ham clubsover the years, and far too many bore the hellout of their members with club business dis­cussions, the election of officers, and so on,having them yawning and fidgety by thetime the speaker is introduced .

Okay, where do you get interesting speak­ers ? Take a look at the ads in the ham rags .Are there any ham manufacturers or de alerswithin driving distance? How about hamswho are into some special ham activ ity ­such as fox hunting, DXing, ham satelli tes,packet, RTTY, slo w scan, and so on? M aybeeven some show and te ll on QRP?

If your club is in the boondocks, then howabout getting the ham manu facturers to do avideo talk for you? I' ve done that for someclubs and even have given keynote talks forcomputer conferences where they didn' t wantto pay my travel cos ts. Wou ldn't your clubmembers be interested in seeing a video bythe top gun at learn, Yaesu , Kenwood, Ten ­Tee, Kachina, and so on sho wing and talkingabout their latest creation? You bet they

would ! I know I' ddr ive an hour 10 aham club meeting ifsomething l ike thatwas on the menu.And with tcday'sdigital video camerasand co mputer edit­ing systems, it' s easyfor manufacturers toput together a veryprofessional video pre­sentation. I'm usingthe iMacDV and aSony 310. Fab!

For that matter,how about doingsome club videos youcan swap with otherclubs? M any yearsago the PhiladelphiaPhilmont Mobile Clubused to do movies o ftheir fox hu nts. Ist ill remember someo f their epics. So getbusy and do somevideo s of your clubField Day effort. Orhow about a VHFcontest special, wherethe club sets up on amou ntai n and has aball? Get your littlegray cells into ac­t ion and get busy.The more club ac­tiv ities you can getgoing, the roore mem­bers you' ll attract.

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NEUER SRY DIEcontinued from page 4

Clubs

How lively is your ham club? How muchfun are the meetings ?

Running a ham club is an exercise in showbiz. Heck, that holds for any club . If youmake the meetings fun , they' Ucome.

My first experience with this was when Iwas elected president of my college ham club(W2SZ). At the time we had about eightmembers coming to meetings. A year later Ihad over 400 active members! Show biz.

When I bought my first Porsche, I went tothe Porsche Club of America meetings andsnored through the technical discussions. Isuggested we get some action going and wasquickly elected president. I kept ' em busy withclub rallies and gymkhanas. and organizedyearly factory visits to Stuttgart, where wepicked up new Porsches and got to drivethem under the supervision of the Porscbefactory racing team on the famed Solituderace track. The membership soared, and weall had a ball.

Then I moved 10 a sleepy little New Hamp­shire town, where I joined the Chamber ofCommerce. Big deal, we had about ten ac­tive members. With some show biz, as presi­dent I pepped up the meetings. I had the gov­ernor, the pres ident o f a loc al college, andsome political candidates come to talk. I hadrepresentatives of the loc al banks at a

34 73Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

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Those P ileups

The ARRL's long-term goal of keepingQRM down on our OX bands via their MorseCode barrier must have the directors jump­ing gleefully these days. Never has the OXbee n rolling in better. Never have there bee nso few American hams chasing OX. I can re­member DX pileups on 20m with hund redsof sta tions all fight ing to get through . Heck,I' ve bee n on the other end of some of thosein my operating from Jordan, Navassa, Nepal,and a few dozen other weird places. Hut, ifyou listen today, you can hear one- and two­station pileups, even on some of the rarestOX. You don't need a kilo watt and a bigbeam to break through these days - all ittakes is 50 watts and a d ipole.

Now, tha nks to the FCC finally thumbingits nose at the League , we 'll be seei ng somegrowth in HF o perat ing. The O X is out thlj,ijj,by the ton - go get it! rt.I

M y thanks to Rand y Frum fo r po int­ing o ut an oversight in my colum n lastm onth. O n page 62, unde r M ic ro WebServer, the correct UR L should ha vebee n [w ww -cc s .c s. umass .ed ul- shriIiPi c.h tm l]. No te the h yphen a fter ww w. fa

URL News

minority, with 57% of lice nsees being Nov ­ice s or Techs. These so-called entry-levellicense classes now dominate the hobby.

I' d like your take on where amateur radiowill be going during the next few years. Ob­viously we're goi ng to have to in many waysintegrate with the Internet, So, let's be realis­tic about this so we can plan, rather than letnarure take its course. Get busy with your wordprocessor and pepper me with disks and hardcopy of your proposals for our future.

In the meanwhile I' ll be looking for ar­ticles on Internet interfacing, and reviews ofnew ham gear. We all want 10 know what youthink of your new rig (or whate ver).

Say You Saw It In 73!

Was the Y2K bug a $600 billion fiasco?Nope, even though we d idn't feel a wrinkle,the problem resulted in tens o f thousands(millions?) o f computer systems be ing up­graded and updated worldwide. It held a loto f hand s in the fire, forci ng badly neededupgrades to no longer be put off.

Wcll, you've read about what terrible shapemany o f the government computer systemswere in. Many were relics of the ' 50s and' 60s, with more patche s tha n an Okie tire.With the Y2K bug about to trash these obso­lete systems, and with no practical way to addstill more patches, many bureaus gave up andstarted fresh. It was a long overdue expense,but now it's pay ing o ff in better informat ionsystems for thousands of companies.

Y2K Fallout

ope rated from anywhere in the world via theInternet, complete with tuning the receiverand turning a beam remotely. What are theramifications of this turn of technologicalevents? Repeaters are being integrated withthe Web, which raises a ques tion. What canwe do to keep any unlicensed Web surfer fromaccessing a repeater and making ham contacts'!Or do we need to? What arc the downsidesand upsides?

How long is it going to be before we startsee ing Web interfacing units ad vertised inour ham rags?

Keith Lamonica W70XX recently set uphis Kachina rig with Internet access. Thefirst contact was made by a Hong Kong ham!Keith is busy putting up a tower and beam,addi ng a pair of shoes, and gell ing the bugsout of the software.

True-blue hams blanch at the horror ofnonlicensces access ing our repeaters or get­ting on the air via a Web-controlled HF rig.Hmm, so what, today, is the difference be­tween an ordinary web surfer and a ham? It'sthat test the VECs arc administrating.

I've got a semisecret for you. When I gotmy ham ticket ove r 60 years ago, I memo­rized the ARRL Q&A Manual and I didn'tknow diddly about electronics. On, I couldbuild a ham rig from an article in Radio , butif anything didn't work I was on my way tosee Cy W2 IXY, just as about every otherham in Brooklyn (NY) did whe n thei r rigsdidn't work. It wasn' t until the Navy put methrough a nine-month cou rse in electronicsthat I really understood what was going on.

With today's equipment, when somethinggoes wro ng, we just send it to the importerfor repairs. I no longer have the test equip­ment it takes to service one o f today's hamrigs. And never mind trying to get into anHT ! Lordy!

And 99% of you are in the same leaky boat.You buy, you operate, and that's it. Okay, then,just what value is there in our passing theVEC tests? T hey' re memorizatio n, pure andsimple.

It's no wonder that in 1963, when theAR RL pet itioned the FCC to make almostevery ham go to the FCC offices to pass thei rtests aga in, that tens of tho usands panic kedand so ld their ham gear for pennies on thedollar, putting every major manufacturer andalmost 90% of the ham dealers out of business,all within a year or two.

Today, in 2000, the situation hasn't im­proved. The 1963 ham disas ter closed do.wnover 90% of the school ham clubs, shuttingyoungsters out of the hobby. And that, in tum,stilled ham innovat ion and pioneering ­which has always been mainly done byyoungsters.

Jack Babkcs W20DO was 25 when he de­velopcd narrowband FM. I lived just a fewblocks from him, so I quickly (age 23)started pioneering this new mode. The devel­oper of SSB was a youngster, ditto CcprhorneMcDonald and his slow scan .

Our serious lack of you ng hams since theARRL purge, I suspect, explai ns why ama­teur radio has contr ibuted so little to the ad­vancement of the art (one of the major rea­sons for the FCC authorizing the hobby) inrecent yea rs.

Today, the average age of our General-Ad­vanced-Ex tra hams is in the 60s. And in the

73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000 3S

Edward Oros AC3L2629 Sapling Dr.Allison Park PA 15101[AC3L@Home.eom]

You're So VainYou probably think this article is about you.

Number 36 on your FeedbllCk card

Alrigh t! So you've finally got your new vanity callsign, and you 've shown i t off on theair. Now, how abou t showing i t ott 10 the res t of the world!? One way you can do thisis with a vanity license plate for your car or veh icle. With ap ologi es 10 early Simonfor the title, here's how you can be so vain ...

Photo A . Here you see my plare (AC3L) and my wife s plate(OK..JU). At fi rst glance, you lIIight rhillk that she is (Ill amareu rroo. hut ifyoII look a little mOl'e closely. you '/1 see that hers lias adifferent meaning, My wife was always telling me, "Okay f or you,Ed, " and 1 think: tha t. for a while, it was her fa vorite saying. Somilch so that 1 suggested she get the plate.

36 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

Vanity plates have bee n aroundfor quite so me time. I' ve hadmi ne for years no w. You have

probably seen these types or plates o nthe road. T hey are us ua lly a ma ximumof 6-8 charac ters and/or numbers . andspe ll out something on the plate. T heword(s) usuall y have some specia lmeaning to the owner of the plate .Some are simple words like somconc 'sfi rst name or perhaps a word like BI-

NARY. which would have specia lmean ing to a computer programmer.O thers like 2M80S (t'tomarocs") haveto he more creative because of the lim­ited number of characters . (I maginesomeo ne trying to figu re out what yourcallsign mea ns in Eng tish t)

Ham callsigns on a vani ty platemake sense because thev have the richt• e

number of characte rs and since theymea n something not only to the ham

who ow ns it. hutto other hams aswe ll. More prop­erly, though , hamcalls belong on aspecialty plate (de­scribed helo w).

It would henice if I couldjust show yo u auniform methodfor obtain ing vourown plate . U n­fo rtunate ly. eachstate has its ownsetup for issu ingplates. and theyvary enough thatwi th the limitedspace of thi s ar-

tid e I couldn' t cover all the details ofevery state. Besides, We b sites like[ h ttp : / /boo k worm . s ds u . c d u /platcs.html] already give yo u some ofthe basic informati on by stale. If youwant a plate, you' re going to ha ve to

do a litt le investigati ng on yo ur o wn,but this art icle w ill poin t out a coupl eof things to look ou t for.

First, you 've got to determi ne if yourstate allows custo m p lates or not. Agood place to start is o n the Interne t. Try[httpv/www.statc.xx .us/] a s a startingpo int. Just substi tute you r z -Icncr stateabbreviation in for the "xx." For ex­ample , Pen nsylvan ia 's stale page is atIhup://\vww.state.pa .us/j . You could alsojust try look ing up your state's Depart­me nt of Transportation (o r Departmentof Motor Vehi cle s) tel ephone numherin the pho ne book.

Once you determine that vanity platesare indeed a vailab le to you. you need(0 look at the options. In so me cases, thereare actua lly a couple of di fferent typesof plates to choose from. and there aremany terms fo r the se plates. Some ofthe various names arc : vanity plate s.specia l p lates, spec ially plates, personal­izcd plate s. spec ial fund license plates.and so on.

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A closing note: While researching vanityplates, I came across an interesting ad­vantage that I hadn 't thought of. Licenseplate COllecting makes an interestinghobby for some. And perhaps it could

Table 1. Here are just a few of the interesting sites I f ound regarding specialized licenseplates.

Be sure to check the definition andrequirements for each type of plateavailable to you. For example, yourstate may define a vanity plate as hav­ing 1- 3 numbers only, or perhaps 3-7letters only. In that case, you wouldnot be allowed to ha ve a ham call onit. On the other hand, many states 'personalized license plates a llow bothletters and numbers.

Note that you may still not be al­lowed to put a ham call on a personal­ized license plate if your state pro videsfor a specialty-type plate for amateurradio.

Specialty plates have a specia lgraphic or otherwise a special " look"to them to set them apart from the nor­mal state license plate. Special platesex ist for everything from zoos to drugabuse resistance education (D.A.R.E.)to wildlife preservati on.

Many states have provided a specia ltype of plate reserved j ust for amateurradio operators. This specialty class of

plate is often referred to as the "call f--- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ­letter," "ham radio," or "amateur ra-dio" plate.

Nex t, you need to be aware of anyrequirements you may have to meetbefore applying for a specialty plate .You may have to keep emerge ncyamateur radio equipment in the car,or you may j ust have to show proofof a valid FCC license. On the otherhand, you may jus t have to provide afee to obtain your plate. As for applyingfor your plate, some states do allowyou to app ly on-line, but others, due tovarious paperwork needs, require youto mail in your app lication.

As with most things in life , there areboth advan tages and disadvantages tohaving an amateur plate. On the down­side, there is the possibility that it j ustmight help some thief know wherethey can find radios to steal. On thepl us side, there are the small thingslike how it helps other hams you'vetalked to (but have never met) recog­nize you at hamfests . And there are theimportant things like emergency situa­tions in which it can help others, whomay be in need of emergency radiocommunications, to lind the help theyneed, or may gain you access to an emer­gency scene where you are needed.

73 Amateur Radio Today· May 2000 37

73 ReviewNumbM 38 on your Feedbac~ card

Breckinridge S. Smith K4CHE104 Brookfield Drive

Dover DE 19901

Another Look at the NW-40EMTECH :, QRP transceiver kit proves a winner.

A uthor 's note: EMTECH ki ts were designed by Roy W6EM T. He passed away shortly after 1built this kit two summers ago. His energy and enth usiasm will be missed. Tile EJo.ITECH productlin e is now owned by h is son Scott KC 7J1.JAS. who is car ry ing on tile fin e tradition.

I had a longing 10 return 10 lowpower CW and to build something. I

searched the magazine ads and the Inter­net looking for a QRP transc eiver ki t thatcovered the complete 40 meter CW seg­ment and had e nough audio to dri ve aspeaker. I didn't want to cover just asmall segment of the hand and I wa ntedthe transcei ver 10 have a large dial sothat I could easily read the freque ncy.In addition. I had plan s to usc thetransceiver during Fie ld Day on naturalpower. so low receive curr ent consump­tion was a lso on my spec list. I reviewedthe data o n a ll the available rigs. andplaced an order for an EMfECH NW-40.

Photo A. Outside \'ielt' of EMTECH NW-..fO.

38 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

The EMTECH kit arrived and I spreadit nut on the kitchen table - which is al­ways the f irst inspectio n process fora ny produc t that I order. 11y wife eyedthe unpacking process. I di stributednumero us small pl ast ic hags o f partsall over the table. She finall y spoke: "A llti ght. Tgi ve up. what arc you doing?"

"I 'm looking at this kit."" W ha t k ind o f kit is it , is i t a

Heathkit?"I lo ve my wife . She has the memory

of an elephant. and she remem bers themany Heatbkits that we re assembledo n ki tche n tab les in the past , most ly inapartments and mi litary housing.

"No dear, Hcarh-kit is o ut o f the ki tbusi ness. hut thisk it by EMTECHreminds me ofHeathkit."

I grabbed thema nual ; if themanual looks goodthen the kit stays. Ithad the usual sche­matic and boardlayo ut. includ ingboth sides o f thehoard. A h. a nicepage devoted to

parts ide ntification explaining whatthose lillie mystery numbers mea n onthe capaci tors and other good ies. Thefi nal assembly page had a nice picto­rial wi th a drawi ng of the various con­trol s, j acks, and fi nal assem bly wiring .whi c h w as poi nt to point. Thi s pagereally loo ked good - just fo llow thepicture and hook up the wires. Hiddenin the hack of the manual were twopage s of resi stance and vo ltage chartsfor troub le shooting if needed.

The most unique thi ng about themanua l and the kit is the organization.The manual is di vided into log ica l, or­ganized sectio ns that make se nse .When you fi nish building a stage. youactually power up the stage yo u j ustbuilt and test it before continu ing onwith the cons truc tion of the rema iningstages . Belie ve me, thi s is the way togo . Th is is a much easier process fo rconstruction than bu ildi ng the wholething and do ing the famous "smoketest." Now I kne w the reason for a ll the

large number of plastic bags of parts.These were the " stage" bags - youbui ld the ki t bag by hag or stage bys tage . Anyway, the manu al looks goodand the kit has passed the kitchen tableinspectio n stage w ith fly ing colors.

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Encouraged by the VFO, I went on tobui ld the keying and antenna switchingcircuit. The keying system is all solidsta te and there are no re lays. The an­tenna switchi ng circuit is switched bydiodes. A look at the schematicshowed it to be really well engineered,with no exotic pin diodes. As I wasbuilding the keying circuit and otherstages , I noticed that I kept putti ng inbypass capacitors everywhere - great,you can' t have enough for a stable sys­tem. When it came time to chec k outthese ci rc uits, I had a problem. I hadforgo tten to put in jumpcr J4 . In the in­struc tion book. the keyer parts list hastwo columns, so be sure to read thesecond column, which in this case onlyhad one item: jumper J4. Overall , thecheckout was very easy and only re­quired a YOM. I looked at the keyingon the scope, and it produced a nicesquare wave pattern .

Next were the RIT circuit and theaud io amplifier. Testing the RIT on thebench resulted in a very stable circuit.Testing the audio circuit was easy. Youcan use some kind of audio generator,or try a secondary method contained in

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During the identification of the partsof the kit, you have to refer to a"Bands Table." The manual covers kitsfor four amateur bands; some of theparts are different for each band.

I started stuffing the board with theVFO parts, and I noticed that the holesdrilled through the board were veryprecise. The parts were easy to fit inthe holes, and there was no forcing ofparts through the board. The VFOwent together in about an hour, and Iwas ready for testing . You will need ei­ther an allband receiver or a frequencycounter for testing and calibration, asthe VFO on the forty meter version op­erates on a frequency of 4 .800 MHz to5.000 MHz. The IF frequency of thetransceiver is 12 MHz, so that whe nyou receive a 40 meter frequency of7.()(X) MHz, it mixes with the VFO fre­quency of 5.000 MHz and producesthe IF frequency o f 12 MH z.

As you tune the transceiver dialhigher in frequency, the VFO actuallygoes lower in frequency. As per the in­structio ns, I adjusted the turns on L1by spreading and squeezing them toget the VFO to fall within the specifiedrange. I played with the large air vari­able and was impressed with its built­in ratio tuni ng; you have to tum the shaftof the air variable several times to coverthe complete ra nge, providing verygood coverage. The tuning capacitor is ahefty, solid unit and mounts on the

Continuing with my screening o f thekit, I picked up the circuit board. Whatgot my immediate attention was thewide circuit traces. Wide traces are im­portant if you make a mistake with aparts location and have to unsolder thepart. In some ins tances, when youmake a mistake and try to unsolder thepart, the heat can cause a small printedcircuit trace to lift right off of theboard.

If you do make a mistake during as­sembly and have to remove a part, thenuse desoldering braid to suck the sol­der out of the parts hole. The braid issold at Radio Shack and has a partnumber of 64-2090.

I commented on the wide traces toRoy W6EMT and he answe red that hedid "PCB design for years, and hisboss liked wide traces." Ali I can say isthat if you have a choice, then wider isbetter for beginning kit construc tion.The board has an easy-to-read silk­screened outline of all the parts to helpyou with the placement, so just use themanual and plug in the parts - it 'seasy.

After the initial inspection and fa­miliarization, I continued with theconstructio n. No one likes to windcoils, so the ins truction manual startsyou off by having you wind all thecoils needed for assembly so that youcan have them ready when you needthem. Most of the coils are on small,donut-shaped high Q toroids, so thecoil winding process is not too tedious.The fina l amplifier ci rcuit coil, L-5 , re­quires two windings . This is kind ofconfusing, but EMTECH has suppliedcolor-coded wires to help you keeptrack of them.

As per the manual, I started on theVFO (variable frequency oscillator)section first. This is a pretty large stepfor starting a kit, keeping in mi nd thatyou are goi ng to check out each stageas you build it. I guess EMTECH fig­ured that if you are going to have aproblem, it most likely will be in theVFO. Grabbing the bag marked VFO. Idid an inventory of the parts. This isvery important, because it helps youidentify and locate the parts for each stepand will speed up the actual assemblyprocess.

Photo /1. Inside \'icw showing PC board assembtv.

Photo C. Breck K4CflE and Russ AA3HX operate the N\V-40 li t

Field Day.

without any real antenna connected ­

I was o nly using the short j um per !

Very im pressive.During yo ur testing, don ' t fo rget to

hook up all the co ntro ls; re memberthat the variable band width co ntro l

m ust be con nected for th e tes ts . It m ustbe fully CCW and not clockwise formaximum signals. and please don' t

ask me what I did . I wa nted to con­tinue w ith the ki t , but had to sto p andplay with the receiver. With an exter­nal antenna of 40 fe et of wire hooked

up to TP6 , I com menced to cruise 40

meters. Checking out the RIT, thebandwidth cont ro l, I even went up to

the lo wer phone portion and listened tolower single sideband phone, veryclear and easy to tune in . The overall

tu ning was very smooth and positive .It was easy to tune in signals and theystayed put. The NW-40 is a very stab le

receiver.Build ing the tra nsm itter was ve ry

uneventful and the tu neup was easily

acco mpl ished. The tra nsmitter uses alarge type TO-220 transistor that isheat- sinked to the chassis. A very ru g­

ged sys tem, and if the fi nal should

need replacing , it would be an easyproce ss.

I have tested this unit at two FieldDays, and have earned the local radioclub's cre dit for "natural po wer. "

QRP operations were conducted in a

typical F ield Day envi ronme nt, withthree transmitters in th e area . I had noproblem with the tran sceiver us ing a

40 meter doub let located 300 to 500

fe et away fro m the other transmitterantennas. The EMTECH suffered nomajor fro n t end overload problems and

was easy to usc. Its break-in circ uits.RIT, and aud io filt ers m ake it a top­notch unit. It on ly d raw s 50 rnA on re­ce ive, and w as perfect for solar powerand "hand crank power."

O verall, this is a very s table , easy­to-build transcei ver, almost im mune to

vibration and temperatu re changes.

The larg e, rugged, tuning capac itor inthe VFO is the kit ' s secret ,and youwon' t fin d th is feature in other QRPkits. The receiver is ve ry se nsitive , de­

tecti ng signals on 40 m eters of 0. 1~V,

Continued on page 51

part, rememher to

check the hag des­

ignated for your

hand . It is a sepa­ra te bag o f parts

for 40 meters, soit will be marked

4OM. Overall, quitefailsafe co nstruc­tion.

I was ready whenit came time to

bu ild th e more

co mplicated re­ceiver. I was now

fam iliar with theboard and how to

use th e instrue­tion m anual. Yo urtraini ng in con­structing the pre-vious stages will

now pay off, as the receive r is going to

have more parts and take up a good

port ion or the board .When bui lding the receiver and the

transmitter, you'll find there is a largeparts count. I recommend that you again

identify eac h part and mou nt the partso n a p ie ce o f card board in the order

of asscm hly. T his wi ll organize your

bui lding and again will help you with

the parts identi fi cation.As 1construc ted the receiver, I noticed

that anothe r voltage regulator was being

added to the board. This was the thirdregulato r - impressive, because voltage

regulation equals stable performance.I had no prob­

lems with the con­struction o f therece iver, and fo l­lowing the instruc­tions, I adjustedT-3 for maximumnoise by car (itd oesn ' t take a

rocket scientist totune for maximumnoise). Then I ad­ded a two-foot wire

a nte nna jum perto TP6 (test point6). and what sur­

prised me was that Iimmediately heardsignals. This was

the manual. This is j ust to "touch the

pot connections with your finger, youshould hear a hum: ' Ah. reminds me of

troubleshooting the old li ve-tube rad ios

many years ago.After I finished the RIT and aud io

ci rcuits , I noticed the e mpty hags co l­lecting o n the bench. charting m y

progress. O bvious ly. as you finish astage you should not have an y parts

left over in a bag . If you put in a wrongvalue early in the asse mbly, you will

catch it when you arc finishing up the

bag o f parts for the curre nt s tage youare building. When construct ing the

differe nt stages. if you can't find a

40 73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

ROOUE I} BEYONDVHF and Above Operation

Accessories for Our HTs

c . l. Houghton W861GPSan Diego Microwave Group

6345 Badger Lake Ave.San Diego CA 92119

[clhough@pacbell.net]

Most all of us have become attached to the ubiquitous tuuulie-telk ie. or lIT as we call u. lt hasbecome a very useful tool not only for communication purposes but also as a social toolenabling us to exchange ideas or just chew the rag with old friends - nol to mention meetnew ones on th e air.

Photo ..\ . Older tCO III tC·202 SSH portable uses Y internal "C"­si:e cells f or portable operation.

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2(X)() 41

These HTs we depend on take quite abeat ing in our briefcases. backpacks.

and gloveboxes. T hey also get humped intowhile attached 10 our belt. I know that I havebeen guilty o f dro pping my backpack do wn10 the floor. o nly to hear a good clunk ema­nate from the HT as it hit. Or whe n wearing

the HT on my bell. I' ve bumped it on theside of a closing elevator door. It is a maz­ing that these vel)' useful tools lake qu ite abeating and sti ll survive the physica l rigorswe subject them to . It's a great cred it to theman ufac ture rs' desig n teams for pu tti ngsuch a rugged piece o f electro nics into sucha small pack age to protec t it so we ll from

abuse.I remember looking at a two-c hannel

crystal-contro lled 2 meier HT at WesternRad io he re in San Diego quite a few yearsago , a nd try ing to decide ifI wanted it or all

lcom IC-202 SSB-o nly po rtable 2 me te r(m uch larger than HT size) radio. Th is wasat a time whe n military surp lus ARC-5s

we re being converted to Hl- o perations. andmilitary surp lus in electronics was king fo rthose on a limited budget.

f or those not familiar with the IC-20 2.it's about Webster ' s Dictionary si ze. withthe fronl panel on the front or book bindi ngside. It contains room inside for 9 "C r-slzcbatteries. About twice the size o f that firsttwo-channe l HT I saw. Needle ss 10 say. ittook quite a few years to get from the simple1 meter FM rigs in taxi cabs to o ur sophis­ticated HTs of today. I remember being puton a wa iting list to obtain the really fi rst

synthesized 2: mete r HT that I c an rcmcm­he r. the Icom IC-02. W hat a po werful p ieceof e le c tron ic e ng ine e ri ng whe n it was

introd uce d .Th e IC-Ol incorporated so ma ny feature s

that we lake for gr anted today - like program­mablc repeater shift, access tone frequencies.

touchtone for d ialing . and total freque ncyagility about the 2: me ter ba nd. The re wasso m uch compe tition to ge t one of these HTsthat I got pu t on two waiting lists. Finally Iwas able to obtain o ne for myself. Two dayslater. the second dea le r called sta ting thatmy tum to purc hase anothe r un it was here .and I acce pted . I remember well that mypartner Da ve Gebler at Puc Bell in programservices. a lso an amateur. had expressedinterest in the HT but did no t get on a list. I(deceptively ) borrowed some money fromhim and purchased the HT. and presentedto him the o ption of taking the HT o r be ingreimbursed at pay-day, He sna pped upth e H T so fast Inever saw the bo xmove . We e njo ye dm any ye ars o f o p­e ration wi th thesetwo HTs. and kept inc o nta c t ove r theyears with the m.

Today. wi th evenmore sophis ticatedrad ios taking on theope ration of a com­puter and containedin an HT body. thelevel of complex ityastounds us to thepoi n t o f havin g tocarry a "cheat sheet"to remember ho w toaccess a ll the o p­tio ns the radios arecapable of perform­ing. Yes, I still ha vemyoid origina l IC­0 2 2 meter rad io andh a ve a dde d itsbrothe rs the IC-0 3fo r 2 2 0 and t he

I C - O~ for ~ 5 0 . alo ng ..vuh a d ua l- ba ndIC - 32 A .

Ge ll ing into eve n more mode rn to ys . Icould no t refu se the tem ptatio n o f a YacsuVX-I and its VO X operation headset mikefo r gatheri ngs a nd swap meet co mm uni­cations . It' s great fo r lo w power com mu­nica tions . a nd has ve ry w ide bandreception. con-ring A M broadcast thro ug hjus t abo ut e very c o m m unica tio ns m odeup 10 I GHz, And it still transmits o n 2 and3/~ meters to boot. This radio is so smalltha t if it d id nor ha ve an antenna , yo u wouldlose it in your shin pocket. It o pe rates on

Photo C. Si:e comparison oj Yo esll VX-l dual -bander and lcomIC-T8IAjol/r-bond /17:42 73 Amateur Radio toaev » May 2000

Photo H. Nel l' team le-T81A four-bandHT covers 6. 2. 3/4. and 23cIII amateurbands. Five watt output 011 all bands. ex­cept for I watt on 1296 M1/: (23clIl).

a multi-cell Ni-Ml-l that is sma ller than a

sing le AA cell.Now just being offered from lcom hi the

world's fi rst a-bnnd HT. Ycs. I said "FOUR­BAND HT!" The Ie-T8IA is fully capableof covering 6 mctcrs~50 MHl, 2 mcrcrs-c­150 MH z, 3/4meter---450 MHz, and 23 cen­timctcrs-1 240 to 1300 M Hz! Wow ! Whata capable device! The IC-T8IA is full-fea­tured FM operation on all hands, with 5 wattson all bands below 450 Ml-lz and I watt on1296 M Hz. Fully programmable spli ts .tones. and much , much more. Included withthe standard HT is a Ni-MH 9.6 volt 680mAHbat tery . I must be Hl -crazy, as I sti ll have

my oid IC·02 (2 of them) and ev en a mari­time model called the M-5. In my case . allo f these HTs sti ll function well today, say­ing a lot about the quality of constructionboth internally and externally .

Well what the n are the bad points experi­enced today from all this ve nture into myworlds of HI s? Surprising ly e no ugh, theolder HTs fare be tter over longer periods ofoperation. Over the years, I have had themstill kee p on ticki ng. I have had to replacetwo internal lithium cells in the IC-02s, andthe o riginal NlCd cells in the same HTs .Remember, these radios are quite old anddon't owe me any thing, as they have func ­tioned well and still do with these minorbattery repairs. Comparing them to the moremodern and much sma ller multihand ve r­sat ile HTs like the VX-I and the IC-T8 1A,their operation is ve ry good from a batte ryconsu mption use rate, but not as good asthe earlier synthesized HTs .

The problem. as I brain it out . is that thecom pute r-d ri ve n proc es ses and hig herpower output on transmit (like my IC-T8 IA@ 5 watts which draws 1- 112 amps on trans­mit) can take their toll when compared to az-watt-or-Iess HT. (R emember, the olderHTs had large, high -capacity battery pack sand double the size of these ne wer HTs.) Ifyo u plan 10 go to a daylong gathering whereyou in tend to use your HT all day long, allof these HTs will perform well - especiallyif you switch to the low power o ptions thatmost all have.

Where extended operation time is in­volved, something more is needed to pulloff long-time contin uous operation. This iswhe re an external battery and its connec­tions to vario us configurations or modelsof HTs be ing pu t to use can take fonn . Thewhole idea came up when I obtained a

Minol tadigi tal cam­era to better describeand submit descrip­tions of conve rsionsand items of no te.Th is was in prefer­ence to not having toreso rt to t he o nehour (expensive) de­veloping on ly 10 dis­cover that I did notget what I wanted.Well, as with every­t hi n g . there arepluses an d minuses.and this digi tal cam­era had i ts ow ndouble-edged sword.T he digital cameraperformed well. but

its operation with four (industrial-strength)alka line cells lasted less than a half hour. Itwas a current magnet.

Well, something had to be done to enablea longer operation time without spending alot of money on battery purchases. Whatwas contemplated was an external batteryof high amp-hour rating as could be foundconnected to the external battery jack on thecamera. Of course, not using the origina lmanufacturer 's cord can take on ominousimplications, especially if you re verse po­larity during the construction and blow upthe device you arc attac hing to . In otherwords. be ve ry cautio us and measure threeand four times to be sure you have not madea simple error in yo ur adaptation of an ex­ternal battery and home-made cord. Thereis no room for error here. be very careful.

The cord I constructed for the IC-T8IAwas quite simp le . I located the radio's ex ­ternal power j ack at Radio Shack . It ' s a3.5 r nm 0.d.lI .3 mm i.d. part #274-1571 A,so a small le ngth of color-coded speakerwi re or a len gth of wi re from an old no­longer-used wall transformer can be usedhere . Be sure to include an in-line fuse ofse veral amps for basic protection. Next, toensure connection polari ty when using sev­eral methods ofconnection. I broke the wireen d and placed a two-cond uctor po larizedmolex/molded nylon connector pair (RadioShack #274-222) to keep po larity from dif­ferent ends proper. This was on the othere nd of the radio connection for cigarettelighter or belt pouch hattery operation forportable use . This enables both mobile andportable operation with a simple cord patch.So far, there is about $5 in parts in this. ex­cluding the Nl'Cds. See Fig. 1 for details onmy cord fo r the IC-T8 I A.

If you have a similar radio and have ji t­ters about constructing your own cord, Icommarkets cords with a c igarette lighter plug(CP-12L) for car operation, and a less costlycord with wire ends for custom connections.The simple cord from Icom costs about $ 12(OPC-254L) and is suggested if you do n'twant to put your own cord together.

The searc h fo r suitab le NiCds endedwhen I fou nd several sets of -l-am p-ho urcomputer batte ries originally for a Toshiba286 la ptop computer. T hese were in o rigi­na l factory pack ages, an d being for only a286 computer, I knew they were orphanswhen 1 saw them . The dealer. having themon inventory for years. was glad to get ridof all of the m for a few bucks each! What afind - if they would still take a charge . Ifigured they would be great, as they werenever used or charged in over 5 years ofsitting on a she lf.

Fig. J. Schematic ofpower cord that call be used eitherf rom cigarette lighter ill auto or til/ ­

other nylon polarized COIlfIl'cto rfo r belt pouch tong-life battery to extend HT operation time.

Hang your next wire antenna the EZ way.

No cl im b ing trees o r ladder s - No tangled str ing - Nodange rous bo w -a nd -arrow. T h is is the perfect too l if yo u

wan t to put up a w ire a n ten na e asi ly and quick ly.

EZ Ha ng wi ll clear a 100 ft. tree .

Only $49.95 pins $5.95 shipping & handlingSe nd chec k o r mone y order to :

EZ Hang, Inc.8645 Tower Or.

Laurel M D 20723P h o ne: 540-286-0176

'Web: http://www.ezhang.collt

Su bscr iptions(0

73 Magazine

Onl y $24.97 - I yea r

$44.97 - 2 ye a rs

$65.00 - 3 ye a rs** hest buy (54l'kJo ff c o ver price ")

Call 800-274-7373

10 thi s de vice . Now, in any pani c duringconnecting cable s with coded connectors,It I:'. sti ll nearly impossible to make an errorin connections. and yo ur valuable radio andacce ssories wiII be protec ted from improperpolarity and cormccttons.

Wel l. that' s it for thi s month . Project s inthe mill include some light wa ve transmit­ter and rec eivers of simple co nstructio n.Kerry N6IZW and I are experime nting withthem . and i f we comple te trial s and con­struction, we mi ght ha ve things ready forne xt 1ll00Hh . If yo u ha ve a lly q uestions,please drop me a noll' o n the Internet at[clhou ghric pacbc l t.nct] . Best 73. ChuckWB6IGP. fa

E Z HHNII

WHITE STRIPEM F TO CENTER+

OJ Df=r:§I§C:)PCLARIZED BLACK

NYLON TO GROUND2 COND OF C1GARETIE

PLUG SET LIGHTER

and you arc dropping o ut o f commu nica­tions . It has ha ppened to me so many times- hut no longer, as I J USl connec t the remoteaccessory cable and battery. or cigarette lighteradapter, and I am back in business.

Just be careful in constructi ng any cab lefor externa l po we r, as there arc many si mpletw ists allowing you to connect power upwith reve rse d pol arity. Just rememhe r tomake yo ur cable d iffi cult if no t impossihleto connect improperly in respect to polarity.This simple step will ens ure your radio goodhea lth. Once yo u let the smo ke o ut, as youkno w, it's very difficu lt to put it hack in.

From the uni versal power cab le I origi ­na lly made for mountain to pping , 1 thoughtI was very cle ver in putting large a lligatorcli ps on the batteryend of th e powercord . I had labe ledthe co rds ne gativeand black, and posi­

tive and red to ensureprope l' co nne c tion .Ho we ver, i t neve roccurred to me thatin a he at o f panicth is was a simplec o nnect io n tha tcould have caused afatal reversed polar­ity whe n trying to

get eq uipment up tomake a rare contact.

If yo u' re fac ed

with this si tuation.do n ' t use the "sui­ci de cord with c lipleads ." Make co n­nections with simi­lar two- o r m ul ti­connecto r ny lonco nnecto rs . One to

th e ba tt ery and amating co nnector to

the equipment cord .Units o f eq uipme ntthat require d iffe rentpo we r or polari tyusc differe nt nyl onconnectors peculiar

+WHITE 4AsnPE FUSEEf -··R ...'0 -

CASE­BLACK

HTPLUG

CENTER. X4 - 16 VCASE-

A test charge proved the batteries to he

in grea t shape. if not original capacity. Whata deal! The quest for large-diameter heatshrink, to make a professional pack, wasabando ned d ue to its high cost. I wrappedmy custom pack with paper center co resfrom paper to wels, and e lectrical tape toinsu late cells from each other. Co nstructionhere depends on the form you want to ob­

tain from the fini shed cell lay out, be it sixin a row of two rows of three each , fo r ex­am ple . If 12 volts is needed, a good con­figuratio n using "D't-stze NiCds is three

rows or three cell s e ac h. If you assume1.35 vo lts fo r a fu lly c harged cell, 9 ce llswork out to he 12.1 5 volts at full charge .

Other voltages are possible. depending o nyour needs. The learn man ual fo r the IC­T81A states that an external battery volt­age of 4.5 vo lts to a maximum of 16 vo ltsis po ssible. Be cautious with vo ltages abo ve16 valls, as when turning on the radio it willdisplay "OVER V" and " UNPLUG THERADIO IMMEDIATELY" to prevent dam ­age to yo ur radio. Most radios ca n stand acar' s a lternator charging vo ltage, which isover the no minal 12 vo lts, but mostly un­der 15 volts. I suggest that yo u veri fy yourca r's c harg ing vo ltage to kn ow w ha t itis before co nnecting any device requiring12 vo lts - just so you kn ow what to ex­pec t. It's a prudent dri ll, and a simple testto make with a vo ltmeter.

w hatever yo ur external battery pack formtakes, it will provide yo u with many extrahours or even (as my pack docs) se veraldays of operations before charging is nec­essary. In the case of my digital camera, Ipurc hased four Ni -M H to replace the inte r­nal "AA" cells and use them spari ngly. Theexte rna l "D" cel l NiCd pack will give me

qu ite a few hours and nearly a full day o foperation compared to the 15 minutes oninterna l cel ls in the camera . Similarly, thelifetime of commun ica tio ns in portable o rmountaintopping is greatly exte nded by the

construction of this simple accessory, andno longer will you ha ve to be confrontedwith the remark that your transmit is gob­bl ing too muc h of yo ur ex hausted battery

73 Amateur Radio todey » May 2000 43

THE DIGITAL PORT

More Software

Number 44 on yOll' Feedback card

Jack Heller KB7NOP.O. Box 1792

Carson City NV 89702-1792Uheller@ sierra .netl

RTTY on a Sound Card

I have come aCTOSS a great program and have to tell you about it. The TrueTIY program UR L,[www. dxsotr.conv/], m ak es 111is software available, p l us a logging program and another [ or C~V.

One of the nifty aspects ot using a sound card program for RTTY is, at least in this case, tha t theconnections between your computer and tran sceiver are the same as for PS'K31. So, if you havebeen using one of the PSK31 programs, you already are hooked up to use TrueTTY.

There is also a PSK3 1 module in the pro­gram that allo ws you to work both

modes from the same program . Even thoughI have been using Logger for some time, Ifi nd mysel f gelling lazy when a lull in theRTTY acti vity co mes alon g , and simplycli cking o n the PSK3l mode and chasing aslightly di fferent warb le tune .

A special au ractton for me is the spectraltuni ng display. It works as well as an y ofthe PSK3 1 waterfall d isplays, e xcept it iswide, simi lar to Di gi l'nn. an d works thesame in both modes . And that incl udes theAutomatic Frequency Control. so you staylocked to e ither the RTIY recei ved signalor the PSK31 signal. Plus, the button nextto the AFC loc ks your transmitted signa l tothe same frequency as the o ne recei ved.

T he prog ra m i s w ri tte n by Serg e iUA90SV and he is doing a good job of sup­plying documentation in Eng lish for thoseof us who are Cyrittic -chaltc ngcd. At thetime of this writing , I have down loadedand insta lled updates to the program, a ndit ap pears the updates are coming at regularinterval s.

Small inconveniences come with worksin progress suc h as this beta ve rsio n ofshareware, But I fou nd Serge i to be ve rycooperative when I messed up on the seem­ingly simple setup process . I tho ught I hadall the ducks in a row, but when I to ld theprogram ro transmit, a litt le window poppedup and I could no t cont inue beyond thatpoint.

I found the program would work just likeit was supposed to if I left my PT circuitdisconnected and man ually toggled th etransmitter. Most of us get semi-accustomedto this with PSK31 before we rig a PTT cir­cuit, so I was able to sec the program inaction before fixing the problem.

44 73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

As a matter o f fact, the accompanyingscreen shot was taken during thi s trial pe ­riod. I was havi ng too much fun to stop andworry about the minor abnormality of noPTI'. Later, I E-mailed Sergei, ga ve him adescription of the sequence of events as theyappeared o n the monitor, and it soo n becameclear where the proble m lay.

There is a cho ice for usin g a full -duplexsou nd card and I had checked it. I was cer­tai n the SB1 6 was ru nning full -duplex be­cau se that is the o nly circumstance that willallow the ChromaSound program to func ­tion. Sergei ex plained that should have beenco rrect; howe ve r, in thi s case, i t is neces­sary to not check that option. Once that isunderstood, the program fu nctio ns likeclockwork.

The program, as I mentioned, is shareware,but the only cripple buil t into the unregis­tered versio n is the fact yo u cannot save thesetup. That doesn ' t sou nd like much of animped iment e xcept you will find the defaultfonts are virtually unreadable. It is ncccs­sary to at least change the font in the reoceive window to prevent eye strain . Therearc two other areas in which you will findyou will wish to a lter the font as well andthe se get a little tiring. The $35 registratio nfee puts a n end to thi s repetitious effort. Asmall price to pay for co nvenience .

You witl nortce the screen shot says theprogram is unregistered, and it was a t thetim e. That was when I was getting a realcharge ou t o f operating the program withmanua l PIT and watching it pick ou t sig­nals and track them as well as "zero-he at"o n those received signal s so the transmit­ted signa l was right o n the mo ney. What Iam saying is that you can easily check outthe program before yo u lay yo ur cash o nthe line .

After a few RTTY co ntac ts, I tuned overto the PS K3 l signals and clicked to c hangemodes, and the program was functioning inthat mode . Simple as two mo use clicks andI was there . T he same spe ct ra l display wasin place , along with the macro s whic h Iwould later learn to custo mize. The firstobvious diffe ren ce was the sing le tun ingindicator as opposed to the RTTY pa ir illthe spectra l d isplay.

As soon as I tuned to a signal, the famil­iar lower and upper case characters startedappearing across the recei ve screen. I madea couple of con tacts there and then fel t itwas lime to fix the afo remention ed PTTproblem.

The biggest thing I missed with the Pro­g ram is so meth ing I need badly. I makeman y more than my share o f typos, andP$ K3 1 programs usua lly suppo rt sending aba ckspace to mag ically repair those errorsI put on your screens . TrueTIY does not asye t suppo rt this feature . I had to ge t into thehabit o f sendi ng a series of xxxx 's instead .

As a matter of fact , I just observed an ­other user of the program doing the samecalisthenics for his typos . For a time, thatwill be an o bv ious identifier for those us­ing the program in the PS K3 1 mode. Maybe,if we wou ld persist in using this program,hams as a group would become better typists,thanks to Sergei.

That isn ' t as difficult as I make it sound,and Sergei te lIs me he wi II work on that part .I think of it as something that doesn' t ex istin RTTY and th at is the ori ginal func tio n ofthe software. PS K31 came later.

The other thing I miss, bei ng a Loggerfan , is a log. r make notes, then fo rget tobri ng up the loggin g program and makerecords. Ho we ver, you will no tice there is afix for that problem on the DXSoft Web site.

They have their own logging program tha tworks with the communications package.More goodies. At this time, I have not gonefor the AALog . I am sure it is a good pro ­gram and serves the use r well, but I try tokeep things simple. Is there an ad vantageto having more than one log? I don't reallywant to start down that road.

I mustmention the fact tha t every ham Iwork remarks about the good quality of thesigna l they are recei ving. This is true in ei­ther mode, I think that speaks well for theprogram. Though RTTY is a fairl y straight­up mode, we have to reca ll how manytweaks we would make in a TNC to ge t itj ust right. Thi s is more like plug-n-play thanmost of the professional, high bucks Win­dows95™ program s we install. And I havenot received any complain ts of overdri'lingon PSK3l which is an easy infringement.Of course, this is after having the systemoperating with other PSK 31 pro grams.

After using th is program Oil the air fo rthe past two weeks, I find a lot of interest ina sound card program for RTTY. At least halfthe hams I mention it to ask for the URL. Afew have gotten back to me via E-mail to

tell me their feelings on it. The bottom lineis it is an easy install, the setup goes we ll(careful of the fu ll-duplex chec k), all theoperator fun ctions are in place to take a testdrive before you purchase, and it works withthe same hookup as most PSK3 1 programs.Take a look.

New t oy

Sometimes we profit from ex perience ,even if it be reluctantly. In this case, I did aright thing first and purchased a kit in as­sembled form . The reason was that I wasentering grounds never before trave led byth is explore r. Thi s made one part of theequation relatively secure and allowed fortweaking o the r area s to get things to work.The hesitation mentioned resulted only frommy normally frug a l approach .

You may have wondered the same thing Ihave about the ability of your compu ter toconve rse directly with you r transcei ver. rkno w there are readers who al so use theIcom 735, and this will hit home the re , butI am certain users of other brands and mod­e ls ca n benefit from my rece nt ex perience .

I have been using Logger for some limenow, and had observe d the trials of hamsgetting the program to recognize the frc­quency of the radio. I wasn' t sure j ust whatwas needed for an inte rface, because theowner 's man ual is fairly mute on this point.Then I found refe rence to l BI Products, sawthey had an interface to do the job, plunkeddown the credit card, and about a week laterhad wha t appea red to be a plug-n-play toy.

Wel l, okay, it plugs in. bu t how do wewatch it play?

I had a few programs around that weretouted to a ll ow a co mputer to co ntrol the735 . My fi rst venture, however, was to loadthe Log-EQF program that came in th epack age because that should be sure-fi re. Ididn' t rea ll y want a diffe rent logging pro­gram, though this appears to be quite a workof art.

At first glance, it appears to be "j ust aDOS program." It is. bu t then I startedth rough the length y, we ll-writte n docu ­mentation and reali zed how we ll thoughtout th e program is . A fter gaining enoughkno wledge to ge t the program into an op­erating mode, sure enoug h, the program

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73 Amateur Radio Today· May 2000 45

122. Yo u can fin d it pictured in the ma n ual.

Looking at the jumper locati ons from thefront of the radio and num bering them I to

5 fro m right 10 left. move the jumper fro m

position 4 10 position 5. That is allthere is

to that.You will disco ver once yo u ha ve arrived

at this pinnacle of success that there a re

some thi ngs lack ing . T he fi rst is, the PITdocs not work through the intcrracc. Hvouwe re using the serial po rt to key the rig whenyo u d ick transmit. it no longer ho nors that

command.

Also. t he rea di ngs arc ofte n a hitstrangc. 1 first no ticed the reado uts did not

truck as I turned the dial. and then th eywere apt 10 catc h up. But. whoa, the n the

read ing m ighL just go to 30,000 kHz or

so , which upsets the p rog ram becausethe re is a pop -up warning that you arc

operating o ut of ba nd .1 have watched the Logger re flector and

fou nd other hams with sim ilar ex periences.and have no t no ticed a de finitive cure . The"works-most-of-the-ti me" cures are Iweak­

iug the tuning knoh just a li tt le off. then hack

o n frequ ency, c ha nging to LS 13 . then back

to US B. o r cl icking the snap but ton in theprogram. T he most o fte n effective c ure for

me occ urs when there is a sig nal presen t

and the n it helps to c hange to LS B a ndbac k .

I would th ink this is a Logger prob lem .o ut 1 find the readouts were not up to parwit h other prog rams I had a lready tried ,so it ma y be tha t this li n lc rad io j ustdoe sn ' t wa nt the wo rld to k now what it is

do ing if we are to o IM y to sit in fron t ofitand o perate the knobs and watch the dials( readout s).

The PTT pro b lem was reso lved. as Ilook the interface apart to be sure the OTRpin was accessi ble . II was , so J snaked a

piece o f au d io cable throug h the interraceso i t ex ited th roug h a ho le I drille d in

th e case. an d inst alle d a se ria l jack onth e ne w piece of da ng li ng cable . Iplu g ged the PTT cab le into the j ac k andall systems were back 10 as norma l as they

get in th is shack.All these radios Vie d ea l with ha ve th eir

co mpro mises. a nd this is o n ly on e o fma ny. I talk 10 o ther hams, and a lmost

everyone who g ives a new mo de a try

fi nds a di ffe re nt prob lem. T hai must bewhe re the sport e nte rs in to the equa tion,

and thai kee ps mak ing fodder for fu ture

col um ns.I f you have quest io ns or comme nts about

this column. Bmaumc ljhcllcrcesicrra.netl ,For now, 73 , Jac k KB7NO. fa

O n toth e next tes t

was di sp laying ther a d io fre q ue ncy .G re a t. it ' s go n nawork !

and

, , I •

T hi s is ge ttin geasy. 1 had a p ro­gram w ri tten byN IAED 10 cont rolthe 735 by way ofthe CT- 17 irncrtncew hic h the 181 boxis to rep lace . 1lo a d e d t h i s a ndgave it a try and itworked A little slug­gis h ly a nd some­times a b it o n thepeculiar side, but itwas doi ng the thingsthat the radio wouldallow. T hat is, it readfreq uency, changedfrequency and modes,and applied memory

already programmedinto the rig,

Now was the time

to go back a nd seeho w this worked forthe desired purpose.With everything in

place and Logger working . it d id not work .Boy, was 1 glad 1 tried the o ther stu ff first.

T he 735 has o ne problem for this app li­cation that I had several no tes on. T he in­

fo rmation fro m the radi o was coming at1200 baud . Some programs obvio usly agree

to that speed . Logge r likes a little morespeed. As one hampu t i t. "The rad iotalk s, bu t the pro­

gram doesn't listen .One of them is fe ­

male and the o ther isma le ."

There is ajumpe rto c h a nge in t hera d io , bare ly men ­

tioned in the Icommanual , that allowsthe baud rate 10 beb umped up 10 9600 .At that point, Log­ger listens and life isbcucr. Nut best, j ustbetter. There is more,

For the Icom 735e n th usiasts in thegroup, the jumper is

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HI URN , ~9 .-\.S USUALL EPN,;]V KKS TNX CU IN WPX QF.Z DE HCGl 11 OFI HlIECQ CQ CQ rr HCSN HC'SN HC'iNC'ZOHTO MTiAGAIN? DE HC3N vv,'AVK B7NO 599·59' t: B7NO KHC N OGKB7NO TNX CU IN WPX QRZ:lE HCBNANBP PWXWQIH HelN HCSN DE V AJ t l DO VAJN

Fig. I , Truertvscreenstiot. Thi.\ 11'(1.1' the second QSO using theprogram, hence the "unregistered" Notation at the top. Th isshould prow' it isn't crippled as YOI/ down load it. The five activeportions of the screen start at the top with the wide spectral dis­pta): [find That it "copies " ('\ '1'11 when not tuned p recisely: bur theAr C will get it right 011 for von immediately. If you wish to tunequickly to all adj acent sixnal, you can do so by simply clicking OIl

the displayed signal. Of course, this means your displayed fre ­quency doe sn 't read correcuv. but )'OU will remain inside the. ..band. The received tea is displayed in the next area down. Justbelow that is the "oscilloscope" display of the received signal.The bottom two screens are the "sent" signals with The composearcu aT the bottom. I had captured this stun after the QSO was

completed. so The compose area was empty: However: The programsupports "type ahead," so l witl usuatty have several lines ready1II/(1 waiting when the other operator tUI'llS it hack 10 me.

46 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

THE DH FORUM

The OX Dynasty Entities List

Numb9r 47 on your Feedback card

Dr. Rick Olsen N6NRWestern Washington DX Club

P.O. Box 538Issaquah WA 98027-0538

I am going to dispense with the colum n this month so tha t I can provide y ou with anupdated DX Dynasty Award En tilies list. We ha ven 't p ublished one in some time now,and I apologize for that. Look this over and tell me if I have left anything out. Vy 73and gud DX!!

IA0 SMO MALTA 5Y-SZ KENYA CE0JA SAN AM BROSIOIS SPRATLY ISLA:-JD 6V,6W SENEGAL CE01F SAN FELIX3A MONACO 6Y JA:V1AICA e M,CO CUBA3B6 AGA LEGA ISLAl\D 70 Y Ef\.tEN C" MOR OCCO3B7 5T BRANDON ISLAND 70/5 SOCOTRA ISLA :-.m CP BOLIV IA3B8 ~IAURITI US ISLAND 7P LESOTH O CQ.CT PORTUGAL3B9 RODR IGUEZ ISLAND 7Q MALAWI CT3 MADEIRA ISLA :,·m

3C EQ UATORIAL GU INEA 7T-7Y ALGERIA CU AZORES ISLA:"JDS3C0 AKNA BON ISLAND 8P BARBADOS cv-cx URUGUAY3D2 CONWAY REEF 8Q MALDIVE ISLA NDS CY9 5T PA L: L lSLA~'m

302 FIJI ISLANDS 8R GUYA:-.JA CY0 SABLE ISLA:,m

3D2 RQTUl\1A ISLAND 9A, YU2 CROATIA 0 2, D3 A:-.JGOLA3DA SWAZILA:-.JD 90 GHANA D4 CAPE VERDE ISLA~DS

3V TUNISIA 9H GOZO ISLAND D6 COMOROS3W, XV VIETI\'AM 9f! MALTA DA-DL,3X GUI~EA

91,9J ZAMBIA Y2-Y9 FED REP OF GERMANY3Y/B BOVET ISLAND 9K KUWAIT DM, Y2-Y9 EAST GERMAKY3Y/P PETER 1ST ISLAKD 9L SIERRA LEONE (before Oct. 2, 1990)4J, 4K AZERBAIJAK 9M2,9M4 WEST MALAYSIA DU-DZ PIIILIPPI:-.lES411 MALYJ· VYSTOSKIJ 9M6,9MS EAST MALAYSIA E3 ERITREA

(M-V) ISLA~D9N NEPAL E4 PALESTINE

4K2, UA I FRAKZ JOSEPH LAND 9Q-9T ZAIRE EA6·EH6 BALEARIC ISLANDS4L, UF GEORGIA 9U BU RUNDI EAS-EHS CAKA RY ISLANDS

9V SINGAPORE4P-4S SRI LA~KA EA9-EH9 CEUTA AND MELILLA9X RWAKDA4U UNITED NATIONS- EA-EH SPAIK9Y TRIKIDAD & TOBAGO

GENEVA EI, EJ IRELANDA2 BOTSWANA4U UNITED NATIONS- EK ARMENIAA3 TO NGA ISLAND

VIENNA EL LIBERIAA4 OMAN EM-EO,4U IITU ITU HQ GENEVA A5 BHUTAN4UIUN UNITED NATIO.'lS- A6 UNITED ARAB UR-UZ UKRAINE

NEW YORK EMIRATES EP, EQ IRAN4l] IWB WORLD BANK A7 QATAR ER MOLDOVA4\V UNITED NATIO.'lS- A9 BAHRAIN ES ESTO;.lIA

TIMOR TI~mR AP-AS PA KISTAN ET ETHIOPIA(after March L 2000) BS7 SCARBOROUG H REEF EU-EW BELARUS

4X,4Z IS RAEL BV TAIWAN EX KYRGYZSTAN

5A LIBYA BV9 PRATAS ISLA:-m EY TAJIKISTAN

5B CYPRUS BY, BT CHIKA EZ TURKMENISTAN5H, 51 TANZANIA C2 NAURU F FRANCE.

FO GUADELOU PE5HI ZANZIBAR C3 ANDORRA5K, 50 l\'IGERIA C5 GAM BIA FH MAYOlTE5R MADAGASCA R C6 BAHAMA ISLANDS FJ-FS ST MARTIN ISLA:-ID

5T MAURITANIA C9 MOZAMBIQUE FK NEW CALEDONIA

5U l\'IGER CA-CE CHILE FKlC TX CHESTERFIELD5V TOGO CE0 EASTER ISLAI\'D ISLAND5\V WESTERN SAMOA CE0 JUAN FERNAKDEZ5X UGAl'\DA ISLAND Contin ued on p age 5 0

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 47

NEW PRODUCTS Number 48 on your Feedback card

the tip, and on/off indicatorligh t. A special safety fea tureis a ground fa ult detection cir­cuit that warns you if yo u'renot properly connected to earthgrou nd.

This iron features a cushion­handle grip, and an easily re ­placeable groun ded tip forstatic-sens itive de vices. Thebase is made from heavy, non­slip steel, and the fun nel canbe mounted on ei ther side.

Fo r more information, con­tac t Elenco Electronics, Inc.,150 W. Carpenter Ave., Wheel­ing IL 60090; tel. (800) 533­244 ) ; fa x (847) 520- 0085;E-mail: [e lenco@elenco.com];site: [www.c lenco.com] .

won' t leave tooth marks. Andth e re is a perfectl y sizedpocket at the back ofthe pouchthat secure ly holds eithe r ex­tra tip and keeps it right therewith your rad io .

And it 's beautifully crafted,too - nothing beats the fee lor the sm e ll o f fin e g lovele ather. The pouch' s Velcro­sty le closu re provides easyaccess to the d isplay. The P1Tbutton is still fully accessiblewhile the rad io is in the pouch,and the speaker ho les are wellplaced for optimal listening. Infac t, the leather seem s to at­te nuat e some of the high ­pitched speake r hiss that mayoccur.

Par further information or toorder part #HI-51 ($1 9 .95 ),contac t Cu tting Edge Enter­prises. 1803 Mission Street, Ste .546 , Santa Cruz CA 95060; tel.(800) 206-0115 ; E-mail lceecscruzio .com).

New Soldering Stationfro m Elenco

The SL-5 Soldering Stationfrom Blenco is electronica llycontrolled 10 provide 5 10 40or 60 walls, and is ide al forpro fe ssionals, students, hobby­ist s. and ha ms . The unit in­cl udes a holder funne l for theiron , sponge pad for cleani ng,

•

PowerPort VX-S RadioGl o ve

This pouch, produce d byCUlling Edge Enterprises, is areal winner. Besides coddlingyour VX-5 (or VX-500) in pro­tcctive leather, it also solves acouple of complaints that VX­5 users sometimes have. Oneis that there just isn 't a com­fortable or secure place for theextra antenna tip with the ra­dio . Another is thai the belt clipwon't stay on yo ur belt.

T he Rad io G lo ve has asturdy spring steel bel t clip tha tbites your belt like an alliga­tor, with a leather covering that

YI 5

If you 're a No-Code Tech, and you' re hav ing fun op­erat ing, tell us about it! Other No-Code Techs willenjoy readi ng about your adventu res in ham radio­and we 'll pay you for your articles. Yes, lots of niceclear photos , please. Call Joyce Sawtelle at 800-274­7373 to get a copy of "How to Write for 73 Magazine."

no t from t he In te rn e t o rsomeone's opin io n. h u t ac­t ua ll y t ak e n fro m rece ntauc t io ns o r a s advertised"For Sa le ."

Inc luded a re th e date o fth e sa le, claimed condition,a nd de ta i ls a bout pertine n to pt ions, acc es sor ie s , andm a nua ls . Sapp.. so ftbound,8-1/2" x 11", $ 11.95 plu s $2shipp i ng USA , $4 else­where .

To order or for fu rt he ri nfo, co n t ac t Eu g eneRip pen WB6SZS, PO Bo x9. A ubu rn CA 95604 ; te l.(530 ) 888-6020.

(NiCds) have only a faint co l­oration that appears as part ofthe m an ufa cturi ng process .Most people see it as a slightblue tinge in the outer case thatothe rw ise reveal s the place ­ment ofPCH, display, lighti ng,speaker, and so forth .

These compact transc eiversare designed to operate in the2m and 70cm bands. They fea­ture alpha numeric display, up10 5 watts power output. 2(Xlmemories, expanded receivecapability offering coveragefrom 76-99Y.995 MHz (cellu­lar-blocked), narrow and wideFM rccc i ve m o d e s , a ndCTCSS encode a nd decode.

Some additiona l features in­cl ude four scan modes, fiveprogrammable scan banks, au­tomatic inte rn al temperaturepro tec t ion , cab le clo ning,SMA antenna connector, 13.8VDC direct input, four d iffer­e nt E uro pean ton e bursts,autod ial memories. input vo lt­age display with overvoltagcwarning, MARS/CAP capabi l­ity, and adj us table AF au diotone . Alinco will continue tooffer the black version of theradio, 100.

Fo r fu rt he r info, contactAli nco U S A . 438 AmapolaAve " Ste . 130, Torrance CA9050 1; tel. (310) 6 18-8616;fax (3 10) 618 -8758 .

! ~,~

HIIIII .-riceG ••hle 2 ....

'l _ ••_ _..

Alinco 's "Clear" DJ-V5

Ali nco USA has re leasednew "clear" or " sec-through"versions of its popular DJ-V5VHF+UHF hand-held trans­ceiver. The DJ-V5TDC (drycell pack) and DJ-V5TDCH

Ham Price Guide 2nd

T his ne w ha nds -on bookco ntai ns pric es for 3,S OOdi ffere nt ham items - prices

,

48 73 Amateur Radio Today. May 2000

ROUERTI SERS' INOEHR.S.I page R.S.I pag. R.S.' pag. R.S.I page

• Hail Sound LTD 25

• LOG Elect ronics ..............•. 37

COmmunications Corp CV4

13 Doppler Systems 59

Radio Book Shop 43

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Radio Book SI'lop 59

Radio 6<::lok Shop 63

Ramsey Eleclronics 3

RF Parts .............. ..........••. • 35

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• Rad io Book Shop 35

•

•

• Universal Rad io 15

•

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34

254 Ross Distributing 35

• Scrambling News 29

187 Sescom , Inc , 2

141 TheNicadLady 45

MFJ Enterprises 7

MFJ Enterprises 17

MiChigan Radio 49

Miell) Compuler Coocepts 21

Morse Tutor Gold 25

• Maha

Communicat ions, Inc. ... 32

• Radcomm Radio 55

• Omega Sales 28

• Omega Sales 46

• Mull iFAX 21

• Radio Book Shop .....•••.•.••... 8

• Radio BooIt Shop •••• •••••••••. 28

•

....""'"

East Coast

Amateur Radio, Inc . ••.•.•• 13

E·Z Hang 43

GGTE 25

Ham Matl 19

Hamlrooics, Inc.............•. •.•. 9

•

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When you buy products from these advertisers. please tell them that you saw their ads In 73,

Subscribe to 73 right now.. .call 800-274-7373 (9-5 Monday-Friday EST).

26014 Groesbeck, Warren , MI480891-800-TRU-HAMM (orders only)

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73 Amateur Radio rcasy » May 2000 49

THE DH FORU M KC6 BELAV S0 WESTERI' SA HARA

contlnuedJrom page 4 7 KG4 GUANTAl':AMO BAV ST SUDANKHI BAKER ISLAKD ST0 SOUT IIERK SUDAr"

FM MARTI~IQUE KH I HO WL/\ t\'D ISLA:"O SU EG YPT

FO FREf\CH POLY:"lESIA KII2 GUA\ 1 SV5 DODECA~ESE ISLA~DS

FOIA AUSTRAL ISLA~'mS KH3 JOHSSTOK ISLA SO SV9 CRETE

FO/C CLiPPERTO~ (SLAKD KH4 \-1I0WAY ISL Al'\D SV-SZ GREECE

FO/M \ IARQUESAS ISLA~DS KH5 JARV IS ISLAND SY. SV/A \IQUl\'T ATHOS

FP ST PIERRE ISLAI'D KH5 PAD tY RA ISLA:"m T2 TUVALU

A:-:O \t1QUELO~ KH5K KIKG\ 1AS REEF T3 CE:"oiTRAL KIR IBATI

FR RElJI\ IO:'\ I S LA~D KH6 IIAWAII T31 PHOEKIX

FRJE EUROPA ISLAf\" D KH7 KURE ISLASD T32 EAST KIRIBATI

FRiG GLORIOSO ISLA~m KH8. AH8 A\IERICAS $A\ IOA T33 BA~ABA ISlAf'\ D

FRlJ J UA~ DE :\QVA )SLM m KH9 WAKE 15LA:-10 T30 WEST KIR IB ATI

FRIT T ROMEU:-J ISLAi'm KH0 \fARIANA ISLAi'·;o T5 SO\ IALIA

Ff/W C ROZET ISLAKD KL7. AL7 . T7 SAN \IA RI/'I:O

Ff/X KERGUELE:"J ISLA!\D WL7 ALASKA T9, 4N4.

FTIZ A~lSTERDA~l A!\D KPI NAVASSA ISLA:-m YU4 BOSNIA-HERZEGOVI:-JA

ST PAUL ISLAND KP2 VIRGIN ISLA:-JDS TA·TC TURKEY

FW FUTUNA ISLAND KP3, KP4 PUERTO RICO TF ICELAND

FW WALLIS ISLAKD KP5 DESECIIEO ISLAND TG. TD GUATEMALA

FY FRENCH GUIANA LA l'\ ORWAY TI. TE COSTA RICA

G. ax El'\GLAND LO-LW ARGENTII'\A TI9 COCOS ISLAND

GC.Gw WALES LX LL;XEM ROURO TJ CAMEROO:,\

GD. GT ISLE OF ~lA!\ LY, UP L1TIIUAI'\IA TK CORSICA

GI :'olORTHERS" IRELAl"D LZ BULGARIA TI. CENTRALAFRICAS

GJ, c u JERSEY :-J (I;3SI S~ IITI ISONIANREPUBLIC

G~1 SCOTLAKD IS STITUTION T:'\ CO:'\OO

GU Gt:ERNSEY OA-OC PERU TR GABO:\'

H4 SOLO~lON ISLANDS OD LEBAKON TT CHAD

H40 TE~IOTU ISLAI'\D OE AUSTRIA TU IVORY COAST

HA.HG HU:-JGARY OF·OI FI:'-:LAS D TY BENIN

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HH HAITI (before Dec. 31,19(2 )UJ TA DZHIKISTAN

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EVSTATIUS13 GRE.'iADA ISLANDS

ISLA~'m

J5 GUIt\"EA-BISSAUVK9L LORD HOWE I SLA~O

PPO_PYO FERNA~DODE VK9M MELLISH REEFJ6 ST LVCIA :"ORO:-JHA VK9S r\ORFOLK ISLAr\ D17 DO\ IIr\ICA PPO. PYO TRlr\ IDADE ASD VK9X CHRIST\ IAS ISLA:"D)8 ST VI:,\CE:-"'T MARTIMVAZ VK9Z WILLIS ISLAr\ DJA·JS JAPAl'\ PPO, PY0 ST PETER AI\D PAUL VKO/H HEARD ISLA:-mJD I/M \ IIS A\II TORI SHIMA ROCKS VKO/M \ lACQUARIE ISLAr\DJO IlO OGASAWARA ISLAND PP-PY BRAZIL VP2E ANGUILLAJT-J V MOl\GOLlA PZ SURINA\ 1 VP2M MO:"lTSERRATJW SVALBARD ISLA:"lD 52 BANGLADESH VP2V BRITISH VIRGINJX JAN MAYEN ISLAND S5, YU3 SLOVENIA ISLANDSJY JORDA;...I S7 SEYCHELLES VP5 TURKS AND CAICOSJYI HM KING HUSSEIN (SK) S9 PRI :-.ICIPE ISLANDSK7UGA SEN BARRY ~1 S9 SAO TO\1E VP8 FALKLAND ISLAKDS

GOLDWATER (SK) SA-S\1 SWEDEN VPS/G, LV SOUTH GEORGIAKC4, CE9 ANTARCTICA SN-SR POLAKD ISLAND50 73 Amateur Radio toaey » May 2000

T_D"~A._._lni 'i~tl. ",,_'i' Ioo DX_IOtioII __

Photo it. Tile DX l rynasty Award Certifica te.

Numbec' c--,,---'Thl. centfle. th.t Amateur Radio Statton

As for the future , I plan to add amemory kcycr to the rig. and I am build­ing thc Oak Hi lls Resea rch 00-1 Fre­quency CounterlDigital Dial Kit to plugdi rect ly into the O scillator Out jack inthe had: of the rig . Plus. you' Il find theOHR 500 on the ai r d uring Field Day2<XXl at the Colorado QRP Club's AlohaField Day site west o f De nver,

The O UR 500 is avai lable from OakHill s Research, A Div. of MilestoneTechnologies Inc .. 2460 S. Moline Way,Aurora. CO SCO I4. Ph. (303) 752-3382.Orders. (XOO) 23X-X205 . Fa, (303)7··1-5·6792. E-mail. lq rp @ohr.com).

Now. if you' lI excuse me. I need to

get on the air. fa

Another Look at the NW-40contillUt'dfrom page 40

and the transmi t powe r can he adj ustedup to (, watts. If yo u haven't bui lt anyki ts lately, try this one . You' ll he thecenter of attraction at Field Duy andbring in those extra bonus points ­plus. you can join the Q RP crowd on40 meters.

T he curre nt price of a complete kitwith audio filter and cubinc t is S130.Partia l ki ts are available . ContactEMTECH at 11 27 Poi nde xter Ave . W..Bremerton \VA 983 12. The ir Web pageis at [wwwemtcch.stcadynct.com] . fa

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 51

Date issued: _Signed _

Endorsements:

the Colorado Q RP Club had its week ly2 meter net. So t asked a few check-insto stay after and hclp me check my sig­nal. Sure enough. I wasn 't zero-beat. Aquick realignment ofthe BFO fixed that.and it's been smoo th sailing ever since.

I can easi ly key the rig with a straightkey. a padd le and keycr, or a computerusing contest ing software and a basic sc­ri al/parallel POIt keying interface . I amgetting quid: responses even under themost try ing of hand cond itions. Re­ce ntly. d uring the fi rst Second C lass Or­crutors Club Marathon Sprint (this reallyis ano ther story). I decided to test out theO HR 500 at QRPp levels. so I se t it at 1-- _250 mW, and worked PA. CA, O K.TX. ~IK. \VA. AZ. and FL.

The Florida QSO was with Bob PaucnN4 BP, founder a nd CEO o f the SecondClass Operators Club. rdid a ca lculationon di stance from my QTH in Colo­rado. and it worked ou t to be rou ghly6.500 mile s per wa tt. So I' ll use Rob 'sQSL card and the O HR 5(Xl to applyfor my Miles-Per-Watt certi fica te.

The long and the short of it You can' tgo wrong with the O H R 500. I wouldsay that the rig is not for the beginningbuilder. ti nt with onc or two single­band rigs under yo ur belt. I wouldhave no hesita tio n in recomme ndingthat yo u tackle this fi ve-band marvel.

QRP with the OHR 500continued from puye 26

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HRMSRTSAmateur Radio Via Satellites Andy MacAllister WSACM

14714 Knights Way DriveHouston TX 77083-5640

Your Home Sat Station

Last month. we investiga ted advanced portable techniques (or con tacts Vi~1 the EM, crossbandrepealer in ttie sky. AMRAD-OSCAR-27. OSCAR is all acronym for Ortnting Setel lite Carry ingAmateur Radio. Now it 's time to look at th e basics Or.1 f unctional hom e station.

Photo A. A Yaes/l Ff-8-J.7 tuned and ready for a UoSAT-OSCAR-j.JFM-\'oice pass.

52 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

ZL2TPO at the University of Surrey in En­gland has reconfigured UO·!4·s systems for

usc as a c rossha nd FM repeater. once againin amateur operation . Unlike AO~27 that isactive o nly for daylight passes. UO·I -I is

active all the time. The up link is o n 145 .975MHz and the downlink ca n be found o n425.070. plus o r mi nus Do ppler.

The re is no thing wrong wi th a simpleportable or mobile system for home-stationusc. \Vith a co nstant po wer source and po­

tcntially beucr antenna s, HTs a nd mobilerigs make a great start. For I ()..mc ler recep­tion. a simple monohand transceiver can add

l l1O'l l' ....."'" II... I ~' i!8i <"_,. ~......v _"".m".»IIl! . "_ 'l!I'I

Photo IJ. Arro w A ntellllll of Cheyenne.U)'oming, offers a mounting bracket forhome or stationary use of their Armw /Isatellite antenna.

to home-brew, the desi red end result is 10

make contacts via the hamsars.On the ne w a nd expcnslve e nd of the

spectrum. an excellent do-it -a ll rig is theYaesu Fr-S-l7 . At around S1750, this multi­band. multimode transceiver can do almost

any thing from 160 mete rs through 70 ern.It has fo ur ante nna connectors; H E six

meters. two mete rs, and 70 em. It can be setfo r full-duple x crossband operatio n betweenthe separate external connections. This in­

eludes all o f the HF/ VH F/ UH F sate llitemodes with the exception of ..~tooe K", 15meters up and 10 meters down, on RS-I 2I

13 . Ke nwood and lcom have their own ver­sions of sa tellite radios. Watch for ne w onesto compete with Yaesu.

A less expensive way 10 prepare a homesta tio n is 10 usc your current gear and aug­ment it with olde r multimode VHF and UHFrigs from swapfests and on-li ne auctions. If

you have bee n following the previous Hamsarscolumns. you know mat a dual-band hand ie­

talkie can he used for sate llite contacts via

AO-:!7 and SUNSAT-OSCAR-35.In February, a new/old sate llite was added

to the fl eet o f H I hamsats. !n January 1990.UoS AT-OSCAR- 14 was lau nched. It beganits on-orbit ac tivities in the amate ur band sas a d igi ta l store-and-forward packet sate l­lite . It was the first 9600-ba ud hcmsat. andil worked ex tremely wel l. After 18 months,

i t was commandedto no n-amateur fre­qu encics for use byVITA (\'o luntecrs inTec hnic a l Ass is ­tan ce) . Now. eighta nd a ha lf ye arslater, the packet sY<i­rem has pro ble msand is no longer use­fu l by VITA. ChrisJackson G 7UPNf

The rig

There are many ham rad ios tha t can beused for satellite communications. Moneyis almost a lways the key factor. From new

I n 1980. the most common hamsat com­

munications mode was mode "A". 1\"' 0

meters up and 10 meters down. A typicalhome hamsal station consisted of a short­wav e (HF) transceiver for downlink recep­lion and some method of generating CW or

SS B on the IwO meter up link, usually with atransmit convener and amplifier. MuhimodeVHF radios were available. tJUI cxpenstvc.

Antennas for reception ranged from in­

door d ipo les 10 mu lti-element Yagis. Uplink

antennas were sma ll VH F beams with two

rotators. one fo r azimuth and o ne fo r eleva­tion .Tracking was done with graphi cal aids

like the OSCA R Locator. Home co mpute rs

we re not yet common.

Times ha ve changed. hut not tha i much.You can still get o n mode " X ' via t wo Ru s­

sian hamsats: RS- I2J13 and RS- 15 . lts fun

and it works. hut the most common modetoday is 'T'. two meters up and 70 cm do wn.

Most amate ur-radio communications sa tel ­

li tes have a rnode "j" system o n hoard. The

'T' came from the transponder name as­

signed to the tra nsponder o n A~tSAT-OS ­

CAR~8 from J A~fSAT in Japan.

73 Amateur Radio ioaev » May 2000 53

Borrow money from pess imi sts- they don't expec t it bac k.

Photo C. The satellite anlenna arrav at W5ACM has beams 011two meIers, 70 em. and 23 em. II semi-dish on J3 em. and a 15-meterrotatable dipole.

LDG autotunc r and m y LDG Q RP

autotuncr. I'm looking fo rward to seeing

w hat pop s up next in the ir accesso ry

line !

For furthe r details and p ricing info r­

m ation. contact LOG El ectronics. 1445

Parran R oad . 51. Leonard MD 20685.

USA: 101.: (~ IO) 586·2 177; fax : (~ IO)

586-8--1-75: E-mai l: [ldg @ldgelcctronics.

com]: We h s ite: [h ttp://www.ldge lec­

tronics. com/index.hrml] . fa

On the a ir

Fo r the last few months, I have provideda cha rt of o rbits for AO-27. Now it's timefor you to do your own tracking predictions.Try it. Check last month 's co lumn for moredetail s on the mechanics of AO·27 chasingand invest igate information fro m A~tSAT.

The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation(hup:/Iwww.amsat.org].

The big news

Phase 3D, the fl ags hi p project fromAM SAT orga nizations around the world ,has a lau nch commitment. Ariancspace hasannounced that P3D is scheduled fo r a rideo n A ria ne ni ght 507 in J uly o r Aug ust.We ' ve been waiting for thi s for a lon g time.P3D is in Frenc h Guiana, an d it's ready togo up. we' re ready. Are you? fa

passes fo r high . etttpt tcal orb its (l ikeAMSAT-OSCA R-lO, . but the soft wareworks line with all the LEO (low Earth o r­bit) sa tellites.

Tra c king

e xpe ns ive. Yaes urotators are the mostco m m o n l y u sedaiming system s. hutthey ' re no t cheap .TheG-5500 AZ,ELrotator system goesfor S650. but it willacc ura te ly positi onthe larg est hum satarray. My system in­clu des an A llianceazimuth rotator andan older KL\1e leva­tion unit. I make a lo tof satellite contacts.and it all works.

p o wer is e xceed ed. T he th ird e rror

d is pl a ys if the re ve rse po wer le vel is

g reater tha n the forward powe r le ve l.

I e nj oyed building the kit and rec ­

o m mend it to anyone who is looking

fo r so methi ng different to bui ld. I look

forward to many years o f usc . I have

had very good success w ith both my

Wattmeter Winnerccnnn uec .jrom page 31

Over the last few mont hs I ha ve been us­ing " free ware" on my PC to trac k th ehamsats. Graf'Irack II and Silicon Eph em­eri s from W5 SXD and W B5CCJ can heus ed on a lmost any Pc. The latest versioncan be dow nloaded from (hll p :!/ ww w.rcallen .com]. I ha ve mentioned Ihis site andsoftware previously, and for good reason.It works we ll and is verified as Y2K ·com~

pliant. I ha ve it running on a 550 M il l.Pentium III and on a really slow antiquePOQET pocket PC. I have no complaints.On the m inus side. it is DOS-based soft­ware and you will have to read the manual10 use it.

Do you ha ve a Pa lm Pilot (III. V. or VII) ?If so . you can get Pockctxat shareware thatwill provide fast accurate aiming data fro m[http://www·.pa lmgear.com ]. I fi nall y fig­ured out how to update my sate lli te data forthe latest NO RAD element sets. and it' sbeen great. T he shareware version is lim­ited to tracking live simultaneous sa tellites.while the registered version can keep upwi th more tha n you will need. The regis­te red version costs $ 12.50 from Palmgcar(URL above). Neither version will calc ulate

Antenn a s

Once again, it is a proven fact that simpleantennas can be used for satellite chasing.If you haw an Arrow II a ntenna (hltp: /1members.act.com/arrow 1461index .hnnl l. orsome thing sim ila r. fo r AO-27 portablework. the re' s no reason it can ' t be used athome. In addition to the hole in the handlethat has been predri l lcd fo r usc with a cam­era uipod . Arrow offers a special mountingbracket to clamp the umcnna to a pole .

There are many very inexpens ive TV co­tators that can be used on small satelli te ar­rays like the Arrow II. Whi le allTV rotatorsare designed for azimuth rotation . they canbe adapted for elevation control with w rylittle e ffort. Tum a typical rota tor on its sideand mount it to the top of the azim uth rota­to r. If thi s is prohibi tively hard. mount ithorizon tall y to a sho rt pole coming out ofthe top of the azimuth ro tator. The boomfor the satel lite antennctsj is then passedthrough the new e leva tion rotator. Keep polelen gths short 10 a void an unba lanced sys­tem . Also, if possib le, put a cover ove r themodified elevation rotator. It was not de­signed for horizontal ins tallation. and thusit will collec t rain water and conde nsationin the wrong places. I have used a plasticwastepape r basket, with holes c ut for thehorizontal an tenna boom .

If money is not a problem. you can spe nda lot of it on sate lli te antennas and a rotatorsystem. Cushc ran has some relati vely in­e xpensive hamsat anten nas. while KL.M andM-Squared have some of the best, and most

In yo ur ca r or on the street, coax lengthis short, and the loss cha racteris tics o f thetccdllnc are no t an issue . Unless your homestation antennas arc within 20 feet of yourrig, the coa x cable becomes a point of con­cer n. Use the best cable you can afford forUHF and VHF runs. Avoid small-diametercable like RG -58. As a minim um. installBelden RG-8 or 9913. A void inexpensiveoff brands and cheap connectors wi th plas­tic dielectric (ins ulator) materials . Hlt-fre­qucncy coax runs are 1101 as critical if thedistance from the rig 10 the antenna is lessthan 100 fee t. I use RG·g on 10 meters an dtwo meters. and 99 13 on 70cm. At 1.2 GH zI usc 7/8·inc h hardlinc, but that's anotherstory. At 2.4 GHl., the down converte r (13em to two meters) is mounted at the antenna .

Feedline

mode "A " rece ption. Check out some of theinexpensive In-meter rigs from CopperElec troni cs of Louisvi lle. Ke nt uc ky, at[hup:/lwww.coppe-r.com l.

HOMING INRadio Direction Finding

T-Hunting for ELTs

Joe Moell P.E. KOO VP. O. Box 2508

Fullerton CA 92837[Homingin@aol.com]

Ihltp:/lwww.homingin,comj

" We 're prscticing a se.1rcll -an d-rcscue technique, officer!" That's how l ttied La explain Id ly myV.1Il was parked in f ront of Illree NO PARKING signs at the end ofa winding str eet n ear TurnbullCany on Road in rural Los Angeles County one Saturday n ight last y ear. Just a hundred [eelbeyond the locked tire road gate in front of the van rvas my half-wall tmnsmtuer and J l -eletnen ttwo-merer beam, scattering signets through the Rose Hills. Ten miles away in Fullerton , a halfdozen cars full of r adio direction finding (RDF) enthusiasts were trying to gel bearings on U.

Phlltll A . This Emergency Locator Transmitter (ELT) I1IOWl1.~ ill

l il t' tail of l/ m w // plane and activates 0 11 impact, (Photo hy TOIIICurlee WH6 UZZ )

54 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

The nearest house was almost a quartermile away. so the main purpose o f the

county's :--:0 PARKING sig ns wa.. to keep

teenagers from gathering at the gate for star­gczt ng and necking . Since my van. bri..t lingwith antennas, was probably a mo re pow.

erful deterrent to party-seeking teens than

a few KO PAR KING signs. this officer de­cided to k t us stay. It probably wasn't the fi rsttime he had encountered hidden tran..millerhunters . (Wc ca ll ourselves 'l-hnnrcrs.) T here

have been three Saturd ay night T-hu nts cv­cry month in s outhern Califom ia forthe pa.. t

twenty years. so we're we ll known.

Adm ittedly, public se rvice is oncu ju.. t anoble-..ouuding rat ionale fo r RDF spo rts .

Ho we ver. a fe w of our parti cipat ing teamsarc qui te ...cri uu.. abo ut the search-and-res­cue (SA IU aspect. For instance. Bob MillerN6ZHZ and Cathy Livoni KD6C YG havetra veled hund red.. o f miles at a ll hou rs to

locate do/ens o f ai rcra ft Emergenc y Loca­to r Trunsminers (EU 's, see Ph oto A) inso uthern Ca lifo rn ia , as described in thisco lumn back in Apri l I99.t.

Other 't-hurucrs ha ve found El.Ts j ust bybeing in the right place at the right time a ndkno wi ng what to do. (See KJ6HZ's story in" Ho ming In" for November 1998.) If some­o ne to ld yo u that an ELT was transmittingnearby. wo uld you be ab le to track it down'!My mail box has brought several recent re­ports o f hams who were up to the task .

Air show action

Last September. Steve Whiteside N2PONof Liberty KS got an une xpected chance toput h is T-hunting ski lls to work . He hadflown to the Tu lsa Regiona l Ai r Show inBart lesville O K in a frie nd's BeechcraftMusketeer. carry ing his new Yacsu Air Pilothand -held ai rcraft band transcei ver. Durin g

fin al approach. thetower asked all pi ­lo ts to check the irELTs . because a nemergency beaconwas being heard on12 1.5 MHz.

" A fte r parkin g ,we started looki ngat a irp lan c s and Ifo rgot about the ELTsignal:' Steve wrote ." A bo u t no on , age nt lem e n walk edpa st us us ing h isha nd -he ld to pe r­fon n a me thodical,row-by-row searchfo r the E LT. S o 1

turned o n my radio and sta rted casua lly

looking a lso . Remo ving the antenna killedthe signal co mpletel y, and holding my hand .0\'Cf the base of the an te nna would alsoknock down the signal. bur that did nor seemlike a reliable unenuato r.

'There were about a hundred show planespa rked in the area : ' N2 PON cont in ued ." With no di rectional anten na. no aucnua­to r. no S-me ter. and a ne w. unkno wn rad io.I wa-, not very o ptimistic about loc at ing theELT. After some erra tic searching. I rcrncm ­bcrcd the ' body fade ' techniq ue. Sta nding

bet ween the row s of airp lane s wit h myhand -he ld pressed against my stomach, Iro ta ted to fi nd the null. T he E LT should thenhe behind me. T he nul ls were mu co nsis­te nt in di rection. d ue to all o f the re fl ectionsfrom peop le and airplanes. hut I kept at it.

"Soo n I co u ld no t get any null at a ll a.\ Irotated my body,Then I remembered to tU1I1.'o ff-freq uency 10 aucnuarc the signal. Tun­ing to 12 1ADO. I found a strong ..ignul neartwo airplanes . Tbc o wner -of onc chec ked hnthhis ELT and h is neighbor's. The y were O K.

"Moving fa rther up this row o f ai rplanes,I had to tunc further o ff frequency. As Ireached the last aircraft in the row. I wastuucd to 120.6IX) ~1HL and heard the signal.

Upon checking at my request. the ownerfound that his ELT was on' Stowing baggageunder the seal had probably tripped the switch.

"The total time I spent hunting was j u.. ttwenty minute s. T he ne w rad io made thehunt more d iffic u lt because I {tid nor yetkno w ho w it performed. No t having anyRD F eq uipment available wax discouraging,and I d id not rea lly expect to succeed. In ret­respec t. it's cl ear to me that the e xperie nceI gai ned by part icipating in the New Je rsey

/

IC-746

Continued on page 62

DR-610T2Mf440MHz Mobile/Base

and erratic. Regular practice sessions cankeep skil ls s harp and camaraderi e high .

A recent practice eve nt put on by theSouth Shore Foxhunters. a g roup on theo the r side of Massachusetts, was particu­larly we ll done. At 0900 on November 7,members me t at headquarters of the MylesStandish Stale Poresr. T hey were told thatseveral people were hidden in the forest and

that both the foxhunters and o ther SAR vel­unreers would try to find them. The major

IC· 756 PRO32 Bit Floating Point DSP HF/6M/2M1 100 Watts

HFlh,, 6M . Kantronicsle -706 MKlIG j, ,fwH,HF ... 6M ~ 2M ... Specl.t ~~

440MHz PrlclnQ/../1 I'N \""VI K PC·3 PluS Packet TNC

c.lI ~orA tilJCo

/ SHCIIlI.

II lI'N I

DJ-VSTHVIUHF, FMHaooheld

PhoJo B. It 's that onet Steve Kirkman KB61MB (lef t) and limFrank KB60NC of the Los Padres Search and Rescue Team usetheir RDF set to find a squo J.l.·king ELT at the Sa nta Barbara air­port. (Photo courtesy of Lou Uananner N6ZKl and AustinRudnicki K6/A )

";,>';;:y"",,,,== 330 0 821'ld 5t. #E, Lu bbock, TX 7942:3

1-8 0 0-5 8 8 -2 4 2 6 iIIliliI¥Jl#-F.'''-':o 8 06-792-366 9 FAX 806-785·36 9 9 liZ~ www.rad-comm.com

Over&ea15 Ordere Welcome

oICOM

AllNCO

"We should havebeen started earlie ri n th e m orn in g ,"Ti m added . ' 'Thenwe would have got-ten be tte r bearingsbe fore the ELT ba t­tcry ran down . Thes ignal was a lmostgone by the lim ethey actually got tothe pl ane.

"Soeedne in Feb­ruary, Don and I aregoing to give a pre­sentation to the StatePolice," Kt::n-rr con­cluded . "Wc' ll coverwha t tra n sm i tterhunters can do ­not just fi ndi ngELTs , but other ser­vices . We 're a lsogoing to ask if theycan no tify us earlier, so we can start he lp­ing before the public is no tified. We 'll prob­ably have to agree not to discuss our activitiesin detail on wide-coverage repeaters. Theydon' t want a bunch of news reporters hearingus and running into the hills, messing up thescene ."

Practice pays

O the r groups like BMSAR know thaipreparedness and training make it possibleto he success ful in operations like th is ,especially when thc distress signal is weak

A mountain rescue

10-70 club fox hums e nabled me to locatethis ELT so quickly." Nice work, Steve!

The vast majori ty of ELT activations areaccidental (Photo B), but these fa lsely trig­ge red units have to be found and turned offqu ickly so that they do not cover signa lsfrom ELTs activa ted by ge nuine emerge n­cies. And when such e mergencies occ ur,haste is vital. ELT batteries may last only afew hou rs . Such was the case in westernMassachusetts on October 5.

Timothy Enl KE3HT of Dalton MA isone of severa l hams who arc members ofthe Be rkshire Mountain Search and Rescuegroup (BMSAR). At 0830 that da y, he wasca lled by fello w BMSAR member DonHorton N IISB for possible part icipation inthe searc h for a twin-en gine BeechcraftKing Air 200, believed to have crashed onMount Berlin near Williamstown.

Massach usetts State Police, the agency incharge of the search, d idn't o fficially acti­vate BMSAR until I100.As instructed, Tim,Don , and Ed Grosso N IFGY we nt to theWill iamstown Fire Station to sign in and betran sported by police all-terra in vehic les(ATVs) into the search area with thei r on-footRDF gear.

"My portable s-etemem beam was a bearto handle and still be able to hold on to thevehicle frame," Tim wrote about his ATVride . "Our trip up the mountain had a fewobs tacles to o ve rc ome. T he fi rs t was abridge out, whic h required the ATVs tomake a river c rossing along some roc ks,then c limb the othe r side of the river bank.I took the chicken way out and c rossed on 1---------- ----- - - - --- - - - - - - - - - --­foot. Then we had a couple of trees in thelogging trails to go around, but we did no tstop until we were faci ng an uphill slopethat the ATV s could not climb.

"Out on foot, Ed took the south ridge, Itook the ce nter ridge, and an officer withno RDF equipme nt took the north ridge .Ed's receiver heard a rise in the noise, whichis characte rist ic with AM signa ls, to hisnorth. I was too close to the shadow of myridge to hear anything, but I confinncd theposition of Ed. My police office r used hiscompass to figure out which way was northof Ed. The office r to our north went farthernorth and picked up the scent of aircraft fue l.That led to the he licopters ci rcl ing him , andthe plane was spotted at about 1530 hours,"

Unfo rtunate ly, the two men ab oard theplane had been killed instantly in the crash.Neverthe less, the three BMSAR hams re­ceived praise from the State Police and athank-you E-mail from a close friend of thepassenger.

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 55

QRPLow Power Operation

The Jersey Fireball 40

Numwr ~6 on your F.edbllc~ c.,d

Michael Bryce WB8VGESunlight Energy Systems955 Manchester Ave. SW

North lawrence OH 44666(prosorare sssnet.coml

Every Novice knows chat pou"er is equal to voltage times current. So. a standard red LED willlight up when two volts <1t 22 rnA is applied to it. The ro ral power required is about 44 m W.Give or take a milliwatt or two. Tha t's not much power in anyone 's book. Bur, on the otherhand. I've talked to truck drivers using a signal generator, but that s tory is for another rime.

Can you make a co ntact using olD mW ?Yup! Sure can! h's easy? All together

no w. can yo u !'oJ)' "frustrat ion?" One of thehardest things to do when running mithwansis finding OUI ho w many of them are beingsent to the antenna. Sure. you can turn thepowcroownontbe ol' QRP rig. hUI ruo st wart­meters cough and gag at po wer levels o f lessman o ne wall . There arc 1\.\'0 ways 10 do realmilliwauing One is to usc a step auenuator;like the aile for the Ten-Tee Argonaut II. Orto U"'C a rig that will produce only milli....uns!You can' t he tempted to c ran k up the powerif yo u do n' , ha ve the juke In crank up.

Meet the Jersey Fireball 40transmitter

If you want millt waus. then the JerseyFirebal l 40 is a simple a nd easy- to-buildultra lo w power CW transmitter, O n a re­ally good day. this guy will sq uirt ou140 ­that's right, 40 milllwans - 10 the antenna.The Je rse y Fireba ll 40 is the product ofClark Fishman WA2 UNN . A sad is t at heart.he design ed the Jersey Fireba ll 40 to coverone of fou r possible baud... You can co nfig­ure the Jersey Fireball-it) 10 work at 28.322~1HL. 14. 160 ~ I Hz , 7.080 MH z. o r 3.540~IH7 . The Jersey Firehall 40 baste ki t comeswith Ihe necessary parts fo r -ru-mcrcr op­eration. If you war n10 cha nge bands, youselect the correct jumper and the n add uicnecessary ti lter components.The frequenciesthe Jersey Firehall40 operates on are nol eas­ily changeable. bUI st ill very useful none­rhclcss. The reason? The Jersey Fin:ball40uses a TrL crystal osci llator "can" for thefreque ncy-controlling compone nt. You canonly change frequency by changing the "can."

Here's how it works

The Jersey Fireball 40 uses the TIL

56 73 Amateur Radio Today e May 2000

oscilla tor frequency of 28 .322 ~1Hz . Theo utput of the osci lla tor can is directed intoIWO74LS74 chips . Each on e will divide theo utput of the TIL osci llator by two. So ,28.32:! d ivided by 2 is 14.161 ~tH1., Dividethis freq uency aga in by two, and the resu ltsare smack in the high end of the 40 meierCW band, or 7.080 ~HL. One mo re d ivi­sion by two, and whoa! You're look ing at80 meters with 3.540 ~tHl . For the ten ­meter purist . the can is run strui ghr rhro ugb.The output o f either the ca n (on ten meters)o r one of the other frequencies is fi lteredby a Scc lcmcru e lliptical filt er. As I said.everything is set for 40 meters.

Keying of the Jersey Firebal l 40 is doneby grounding the TTL osci llator. r fou nd thekeying to he a hit hard. hUI that's O K, too .You kind of want the keying to he a little o nthe hard side. so yo ur signal stands ou t fro mthe bird ies in the guy's receiver.

The entire Jersey Firebal l 40 is op eratedfrom a +5 vo lt supply provided by the on­hoard LM78L05Z regulato r. The inp ut volt­age can be anything from 9 to 14 \"OI lS. Anine-vol t transistor battery would be an idealpo we r so urce for the Jersey Pircball -tu .

Options galore

J ust like an S UV, yo u can get the JerseyFireball 40 loaded with IWo ve ry im portanto ptions . First . you can add the TiC K kcyc r.The TiCK is a s lick supe r-small iambickeycr on a chip. There's a PG~f connector onthe bottom of the PC board for controlling allthe magic the TICK keyer will do .

The other o ption is the OIlC I installed.It 's the o ne-wall amplifi er! Now, 1 am go­ing 10 sound like my huddy Randy KDSJN,and say 1 o nly turned it on when I neededto . But that o ne watt is a hell o f a kick from40 rni lt lwau s . Th e ampl ifi e r use s a:!N"2221A tran sistor.

Build ing the Jersey Fireball 40

The Jersey Fireball .w is assembled o n adouble-sided PC board .The hoard measures2" x 3". The re is no si lk-screen, hut someof the pan locations are etched into tbeboard. You ge t j ust the basic componentsfor the 40-me ter band. Also missing are thea mplifi er part s. and of co urse the TiCKkcyer.

Assemb ly is quick: most o f the ac tivepam are IC chips . Yo u need 10 wi nd the fi l­jer roroids an d install the vario us capaci ­tors for the tille rs. You sho uld be ublc 10sluff the PC board, wind the coils, a nd putit o n the air in le ss than two ho urs.

You ' ll need some sort of T/R switc hing.The Jersey Fireba ll 40 docs no t have anymeans of switching the anten na fro m therece iver to the Jersey Fireball 40 . There isno stdcrone. e ither. 1 used the TlR control­le r I did se vera l years ago. As fo r a receiver.my old Heathki t HR 1680 worked for me.

Testing

About the only thing you have 10 do is 10check yo ur work o n the PC hoard, and ap­ply powe r. Be sure yo u have the OUIPUI intoa 50-ohm load, and key the rig. You can lis­len to yourself o n a recei ver. The keyingshould be nice and d ean. if it is a bit 100hard for your liking . you can add a .0 1 ca ­pacitor 10 the key line 10 soften the keyingup . That's about the o nly thing you ha ve 10do 10 ge t this guy on the ai r.

How does it work?

Well the Je rsey Fi reball -l0 works justgreat o n the test bench. Making QSOs withit is another matter. Oh. don 't misunderstand

Cont in ued on page 62

ON THE GoMobile, Portable and Emergency Operation

Number 5 7 on your Feedback card

Steve Nowak KE8YN/41011 Peacock Ave. NE

Palm Bay FL 32907-1371[ke8yn@netzero.net]

Good Operating, and a New Headset on the Block

There are two things in p articular that make writing this column so m uch Iun. The first is th echance to m eet great people with whom to share idea s, and the secon d is the chan ce to playwith some great lOYS. This month I've had a chan ce to do both, an d both may well Imp r ove myopera ting ability .

Photo A . Comfortable to wear and featuring clear audio. the WarrenGregoire TR-20(X) headset has a noise-canceling microphone and ei­ther PIT orfoot switch for transmitting. KE8YNI4 models.

73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000 57

w here I work coordinate some emergencycom mu nications p lans . Since there is thedis tinct risk of fl ood ing due to tid al surgeduring hu rr ic ane s, the co ntinge ncy pl ansincl ude provisions for all critic al de part ­ments located on the first n ON to he rcto­cured to h igher grou nd . T he te le p honesw itchboard. for exam ple, has a bac kuploc at io n on the second 110m. Th is bac kuplocation is pla nned as a co mmu n icat io nsh uh with te lephone eq u ipmen t as well asanten na co n ne ctio ns fo r two hospital ra ­dio syste ms, the c o unty e merg ency rad iosystem, and the two mete r amate ur band .Sin ce the room is rathe r sma ll , r began toth ink of ho w no isy it would be if a llthesecom m un icators were try ing to do the irjohs at the sa me ti me . Si nce lo sing theground flo or me ans that space wou ld heat a premiu m, this may be the best or onlylocation for a ham station. I realized that aheadset with a boom microphone would prove

A couple of issues back, I wrote aboutthe fun of ten meter FM . I included a

chart showing some of the frequencies incommon usage. O f course, the fact that afrequency is in common use for a particu­lar purpose docs not mean that it in factshould be used for (hat purpose. One fre­quency that is commonly used for simplexcommu nications , 29.480 MHz. sho uld no tbe used for 10 meter PM since it is prima­

ri ly use d fo r satellite comm unications. I re­ceive d a no te from K50E by Ecmai l

poin ting thi s o ut, and he mentioned that this

usc was lis ted in the Courteous Operato r 'sGuide. T hanks for the heads up, Jerry.

Jerry 's message got me to thinking abo ut

some of the real advantages o f this ho bby.As a group we te nd to look at one anotheras com patrio ts. We also tend to try to work

th ings o ut among o urselves rathe r thanwaste a lo t of effort assigning blame . T heseci vilitie s were once more common and are

still the norm among hams. which says alot about us as a group. A lthough we are

governed by the FC C ru les and regulations,

we also adhere to our own guidelines, w hichare o ften refe rred to as " Good Amateur

Practices." These in clude ro utine courtesiesand the A RR L's A mateur's C ode . We dothese things not because we are forced to ,but because it makes fo r a better hobby.

While it's always easy to poi nt out what" they" s hou ld do to m ake this a be tterhobby, it's a litt le harder, a ltho ugh mo reproductive, to determine what "we" should

do. In my case, I decided to do the fo lluwing:Take the time to re-read the Amateur 's

Code (found in the ARRLHalldbook). T hiscode lists six key concepts : T he amate ur isConsiderate, Loyal, Progressive, Friend ly,

Balanced, and Patriotic . Sometimes theseold- time values are the best guide .

Review Part 97, the regulation s that gov­ern Amateu r Radio. Even without the li­ce nse re st ru c tu r ing , th e r e were somechanges with which I was no t as familia r asI should h ave bee n. T he re arc a numbe r o fWeb sites that provide current copies o f theru les , including the league 's home page[ww w.arrl .org ].

Kee p a copy of the Courteous Ope rator 'sGuide near my rig (and m y word proces­sor) - and double c heck it for competi nguses ofa frequency!

Make sure that I think to check my trans­mitter output. A m I only usi ng the minim umpower for the QSO in which I' m engaged?A nd. finally, I' m going to conscio us ly pausebefore pressin g the push-to -talk button togi ve someone else a c hance to call, part icu­larl y on 2 mete rs, After all, there rarely issomethi ng so important that I have to saythat it can ' t wai t for an additional second o rtwo.

It's always po ssi ble to do something JUSta li ttle better, and doing it bette r should beno i nconve n iencew h e n it i n v o l v e ssomething as enjoy­able as this hobby.I ' m g o i ng to dothese th ings now toimprove my o pe ra t­ing , an d also I ' mgoi ng to do a self­c heck every so oftenjust (0 see w h a to ther areas I can bebetter at. A ny ide asyo u m ight ha ve toimprove the hobby ?D rop me a no te .

A few months ago,I w as in vol ve d inhe lping the hospi tal

...

Contin ued on page 62

k g

[RLENORR EUENTS Number 58 on YOll r Feedback card

Listings are free of charge as space permits. Please send us your Calendar Event rwo months inadvance of the issue y ou wan r it to appear in. For example, if you want it to appear in theAugust issue, we should receive it by Mey 31 . Provide a clear, concise summary of the essentialdetails about y our Calendar Event.

MAY 6

CADILLAC, MJ The Wexaukee ARC will holdtheir Annual Amateur Radio and ComputerSwap Meet on Saturday, May 6th, from 8 a.m.to 1 p.m., at the Cadillac Jr. High School. Talk­in on 146.98 rptr. Free parking. Admission is$5. Tables $8 for an 8 It. table. For table infocontact NU8L, (231) 862-3774; or E-mail{amcconneIl3@hotmail.comj. There will be VEexams at 10:30 a.m. Contact WA8LKV; (231)829-3433 or E-mail {avanant@netonecom.net]. You must pre-register for testing.

CEDARBURG, WJ The Ozaukee Radio Clubwill sponsor its 22nd Annual CedarburgSwaptest. 8 a.m.- 1 p.m. at the Circle-B Aec.Center, Highway 60 and county I (located 20miles north 01 Milwaukee, west of Grafton).Admission $4, both in advance and atthe door.4-1t. tables are $5 (limited power on request).Seller's setup at 6:30 a.m. VE exams start at9 a.m. Talk-in on 146.37/.97 and 146.52. Fortickets , table reservations, maps or more info,send an SASE to Joe Holly, ORC Swapfestcnesmen, 1702 HollyLane, Grafton WI 53024.Tel. (262) 377-2137.

SILOAM SPRINGS, AR The Siloam SpringsARC Hamtest and Flea Market will take placeat St. Mary's Catholic Church at 1996 Hwy.412 East in Siloam Springs AR. Hours are 8a.m.-3 p.m. Talk-in on 146.67. Computerseminars will be held during the hamfest.Contact Matt Hyde N5UYK at (501) 524-4797.

OWEGO, NY The Binghamton ARA will hostthe 2000 Owego Hamfest, May 6th, startingat 8 a.m., at Tioga County's Marvin ParkFairgrounds. Setup for vendors and tailgatersat 6 a.m. Indoor vendors who require Fridaysetup, ca ll ahead of time. Admission 55.Tailgate spots $2. Indoor tables $10 ea. VEexams will be conducted in a quiet setting atthe school next door. For more info, or toreserve an inside table, E-mail {rmess@binghamton.edu}; or call Bill Coleman N2BC,(607) 748-5232; or write to SARA, P.O. Sox853, Binghamton NY 13902-0853.

MAY 6-7

ABILENE, TX The Key City ARC will sponsortheir 15th annual Hamfest at the Abilene CivicCenter from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat. , May 6th, andfrom 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Sun., May 7th. Freeparking . VE exams . Wheelchai r access.

58 73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000

limited RV parking for a nominal fee. Tables$6 each. Pre-registration $7 (must be receivedby May 1st), 58 at the door. Talk-in on 146.1 601.760. For reservations and inlo contact PegRichard KA4UPA, 1442 Lakeside Dr., AbileneTX 79602; tel. (915) 672-8889. E-mail{ka4upa@arrl.netj.

MAY ?

HAGERSTOWN, MD The Antietam RadioAssn., Inc.'s 8th Annual Great HagerstownHamfest & Computer Show "The MillenniumHamtest' will be held at Hagerstown Com­munity College Rec. Center. From Interstate70, take Exit 32B to Edgewood Dr. (HomeFederal bank on right). Turn right. Drive 1.4miles. Entrance to the college is on the left.Follow signs. From the north or south, takeInterstate 81 to Interstate 70 East. Followdirections as above. Talk-in on 146.94 and147.09 rptrs. (W3CWC). Gates open at6 a.m.,building opens at 8 a.m. General admission$5, children 12 and under tree. Tailgating isan additional $5 per space on an asphalttailgate area. New and used computers andsupplies, and ham radios will be the featureditems. VE exams by the ARR L VEC Team, onthe 2nd floor of the Rec. Center. Walk-ins OKat 8:30 a.m. For more info contact GregLanham WA 4VE, (540) 772-4792. E-mail[kuan@visuallink.comj. There will be an AARLforum at10 a.m., and an ATV forum at t t a.m.

YONKERS, NY The Metro 70cm Network,WR2MSN, will sponso r a Computer andElectronic Flea Market, May 7th, at LincolnHigh School, Kneeland Ave., Yonkers NY,starting at9 a.m. Vendors setup at7 a.m. Freeparking. Admittance $6, under 12 years free.Talk-in on 440.425 Pl156.7 and 146.910 Pl114. Vendors, call WB2SL Q after 7 p.m. at(914) 969-1053; or E-mail [Wb2slq@juno.com]to register. The Metro 70cm Network is anemergency communications network covering4 states.

MAY 20

FORESTDALE, RI The Rhode Island AmateurFM Repeater Service, Inc., which operates the146.76,146.94.223.76 and 447.425 repeatersin Rhode Island, wil l hold their annual SpringFlea Markel and Auction at the YFW Post6342, Main Street, Forestdale (No. Smithfield)AI on Saturday, May 20th. Take the Forestdaleexit off Route 146 in No. Smithfield; take a left

at the end of the ramp and go six tenths of amile to the Post on your right, just before theVillage Haven Restaurant. Please observeparking instructions. The flea market opens atabout 8 a.m. and spaces are $5 each. Somespaces are available under the pavilion on afirst-come, first-served basis. The auction wi llbe held 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Tal k-in on 146.76. Formore info, contact Rick Faitweather K1KYI,106 Chaplin St.. Pawtucket RI 02861 : tel. (401)725-7507 between 7 and 8 p.m. only. E-mail{k1 kyi@arrl.net].

MAY 21

FAIR OAKS, CA The North Hills Radio Clubof Sacramento CA will hold its annual Swap­meet at Bella Vista High School, 8301 MadisonAve. , Fair Oaks CA. From 1·80 (Sacramento­Roseville), go east on Madison Ave. for 5.8miles to the high school on the left. From Hiway50, g6 north 2.6 miles on Hazel Ave. toMadison Ave.; turn left onto Madison Ave. for1.4 miles. The school is on the right. Sellerspaces (2 car stalls) are $10. Free parking forbuyers. For more info contact Earl S. MeadK6ESM, (916) 331-1115; or E-mail (nhrc@k6is.org). Check the Web at [http://www.K6IS.orgj.

MAY 26-27

PASCAGOULA, MS The Jackson CountyARC will hold its 6th annual Hamfest in theCivic Center at the Jackson County Fair­ground,S p.m.-9 p.m., Friday May 26th; and8 a.m-e p.m. Saturday, May 27th. Talk-in onW5WA 144.510/145.110. Dealer setup beginson Friday at noon. TIckets are $2.50, no morethan $10 for immediate family. Tables $8/8 ft.table. AV parking available on site. VE exams11 a.m. Saturday. The test fee is $6.65 and itis mandatory that you bring a picture 10, youroriginal license and license copy. No chargefor Novice testing. E-mai l {montehat@datasync.comj or [irag @mindspring.com} toreq uest a flyer. For more info contact HamfestChairman Charles F. Kimmerly N5XGI, 19000Busby Rd. , Vancleave MS 39565. Tel. (228)826-5811 .

MAY 28

WEST FRIENDSHIP, MD A Ham/est will beheld by the Maryland FM Assn., at HowardCo.Fairgrounds, 8 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Take 170 to Ate.32, S to Rte. 144; turn right, go W on Rte . 144,

B ack IssuesOnly $5.00 Each!Call &CJO.274·7373

MAY 20

WINFIELD, IL The DuPage ARC , incommemoration of Arme d Forces Day, willoperate Special Event Station W9DUP, 1630ZMay 201h-2300Z May 20th. Operation will beon 7.250 , 14.290, 28.400 and 145.25/144.66MHz. Stations may request a certificate. QSLwi th an SASE to John McCar ty N9HR T,DuPage ARC. P O. Box 71, Clarendon Hills IL60514. Fa

one point per phone QSO and two points perCW or RTTY QSO. QSOs with club stationW1QI and ARRL HQ station W1AW count 5po ints . Connecticut sta tions multiply QSOpoints by statesiprovincesiCT counties worked(OX only one multiplier); others multiply by CTcou nt ies worked (work CT stations only) .Plaques and certificates (100 point minimum).Special certificate for working all 8 Connecticutcounties. Send entry and SASE for results byJune 7th to CARA, Po. Box 344 1, DanburyCT06813-3441.

MAY 5-7

SPECIAL EVENTS, ETC.

for vendors to set up at 7:30 a.m. Buyersadmitted at 9 a.m. Free parking. VE exams at10 a.m. Admission by donation, buyers $5.Sellers $10 per space. Talk-in on 444.200 rptr,PL 136.5; 146.52 simplex. Contact (eves. only)Stephen Greenbaum WB2KDG, (718) 898­5599. E-mail WB2KDG @Bigtoot.com] or AndyBorrok N2TZX, (718) 291 -2561 ; E-ma il[N2TZX@webspan.netj. For info about the VEexams, contact Lenny Menna W2LJM, tel.(718) 323-3464, or E-mail [LMenna6568@aol.com].

MAY 6-7

MARTHA'S VINEYARD ISLAND, MA The FallRiver ARC will operate W1ACT portable fromthe Gay Head Lighthouse on Martha's Vineyard(IOTA NA-046). Frequencies: 14.260,21.260,28.460 and 146.55 MHz. Operation will startMay 5th at 18:00 UTC and end May 7th at21 :00 UTC. Please QSL SASE via N 1JOY.

CONNECTICUT QSO PARTY T heCandle wood ARA will sponsor the Con­necticut QSO Party 2000Z May 6th-2000ZMay 7th, with a rest pe riod 0400Z-1200Z.Phone, RTTY andCWo Wo rk s ta tions r-' _

once per band andmod e, mobi les asthey cross cou ntylines . No re peaterQSOs. S ingle op ­erator, f ixed/mobile ,Novice, QRP (5W) ,Multi -s ingle Mu lt i­multi classes plu sConnecticut clubco mpeti tio n .Connect icut stationsmay contact otherConnecticut stationsfo r QSO/multip lie rcredit. Connecticu tstatio ns exch angereport and county;others exchangereport an d s ta telprov ince l D XCCcountry. Non-CTstations wor k CTstations only. CW ­40 kHz up from lowerband edges; Nov ices25 kHz up from lowend. Phone-1.860,3.915. 7.280 , 14.280,21.380, 28.380. VHF- 50.150, 144.200,146. 580. RTTY ­Normal RTTY bands.All bands (HF, VHF,UHF) except WAR Cbands count. Score

approx. 1 mile to the fairgrounds. Talk-in on146.76, 224 .76, or 444.00. Admission $5.Tables $20 in advance , $25 at th e door.Tai lga te space is $5 per space . Fo rreservations , contact Mike WA3T/D, P.O. Box19, Annapolis Junction MD 20701. Tel. (410)923-3829.

SPRINGFIELD,IL A Hamfest will be held June3rd at Illinois State Fairgrounds. Enter Gate11 . This even t is being co-sponsored bySangamon Valley Radio Club & Shooting Stars4-H Club. Talk-in on 146.685(-). Flea marketopens at 6 a.m.; building opens at 8 a.m.Tables $5 in advance. Admission tickets $5each. No extra charge for cove red flea marketspaces. ARRL VE exams. For more detailscontact Ed Gaffney KA9ETp, 13977 FrazeeRd., Box 14A, Divernon IL 62530. Tel. (217)628-369 7; or E-mail to [egaffney@ family­net.net].

JUNE 4

MANASSAS, VA The Ole Virginia Hams ARC,Jnc., will hold Virgini a 's Orde Fa sh ionedManassas Hamfest at Prince William CountyFairgrounds. 1/2 mile south of Manassas VAon Route 234. Talk-in on 146.97(-), 224.660(-),and 442.200(+) . Indoor exhibitor space , 8 ft.tables $30 each, with chairs and electrici ty .Setup 2 p.m.-l 0 p.m. Saturday. Generaladmission is $5 per person at the gate. Noadvance sale . Gates open at 7 a.rn . Freeparking . Tailgat ing $5 per space (plus ad­mission). Gates open at6 e.m. Setup 2 p.m.­10 p.m. Saturday. Find directions, details, andhotel info at the Web site [http:// www.qsl.net/olevahams]. Dealers, contact Jack N4YIC,(703) 335-9139; Fax: (703) 330-7987; E-mail[N4YIC @arrl. net] or [patnjack@erols.com].For general info, contact Mary Lu KB4EFP, tel.(703) 369-2877; E-mail [mblasd1638@aol.comj.

GRAND RAPIDS, MI The annual IRA Ham­festival, West Michigan's largest hamtest. willbe held at the Hudsonville Fai rgrounds nearGrand Rapids. Talk-in on 147.16 link rptr.system. Doors open at 8 a.m. for generaladmission . Free parking. Dealers can setupon the 2nd after 7 p.m., or after 6 a.m. on thearo . Bring your ham equipment , coax,computer equipment, software, books, wire ,jewelry, sweat-shirts etc . to sen. Hams, bringyour used equipment to trade or sell. Computerhobbyists , bring your excess hardware ,software, books ,etc. to trade or sell. Ovemightcamping is available, $10 . VE exams at 10:30a.m. Indoor table space , 8 ft . tables $8 each.10 ft. trunk sales spaces, $6. Contact Kathyat(616) 698-6627 Irom 4p.m. to 7 p.m. EST. Visitthe Web at [http ://www.iserv.net/-wBhvg].

JUN 3

QUEENS, NY The Hall of Science ARCHamfest will be held at the New York Hall ofScience parking lot, Flush ing Meadow CoronaPark,47-01 11 1th St. , Queens NY. Doors open

73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000 59

PROPAGATI ON Num ber 60 on your Feedback card

Jim Gray W 1XU/7210 E Chateau

Payson AZ 85541[jimpeg@ netzone.com]

Unusual Activity and a Conjunction, Too!

You can expect som e exceptional solar activity accompanied by severe ionosphere andmagnetic field disturbances d ur ing th e secon d and four th weeks of th is month.

I n fact. it is possible thai intense aurora effects combine to May 2000will occur around the 81h and 24th of thi s prov i de the UIl -

month, whereas the first an d third weeks are us ual acti vity de- SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SATexpec ted to provide Fair 10 Good propaga- scribed thi s month.

I •

lion co ndit ions 011 the HF ban ds. Check the Please be aware 1 F 2 F~P 3 P~F 4 F 5 F~P 6 P

VHF hands during the second and fourth that extreme weather 7 P-VP 8 VP 9 vp·p lO P 11 P-VP 12 VP·P 13 P-Fweeks for unusual activity and some long- and possibly other

haul OX on six meters during a few days. severe geophysical 14 F 15 F-G 16 G 17 G 18G 19 G 20 G

We are no w approaching the solar maximu m upsets may be ex- 21 G-F 22 F-P 23 P-VP 24 VP 25 VP-P 26 P 27 P-Fof Cycle 23 and the summer sols tice. whose pcctcd in the northern

2. F 29F 30 F-G 31 G

EASTERN UNITED STATES TO:

GMT: 00 ca 0- M 00 io ra " re te ao ee he m is phe r e th i s by solar g lare. On the morning o f May 3 1stALASKA 1011 2 eo 17120 so 15117 10112

month, partic ula rly at about 40 minutes befo re sunrise. thereARGENTINA 151 17 1511 7 ao W<O 30140 1011 2 12115 12115

AUSTRA.l.IA 10/12 17120 ao ao ao 30140 W<O 17120 10112 o n the xth- Ll th and will be a Jupiter/Saturn/Moon configurationICENTRAL AM. 15117 17120 17120 17120 17120 15/ 17 15117 10/12 10112 10112 17120 1(.'12 the 23rd-26th . about 2 degrees above the horizon. with the,ENGLM D 17/20 W<O 40160 40/60 30140 15117 101 12 15/17 15117 17120

IHAWAII 10112 12"15 17120 17120 'MO '000 17120 171:20 1(0/12 Fm a vid s ky Moon about 10 degrees to the up pe r right.INDIA 17/20 17120 15117 watchers and e arly Aga in, possib ly di ffic ult to see .JAPAN 10112 17120 17120 171:20 15/17 10112

'MEXICO 12/15 :20140 20140 w<o 20140 10.'17 15/17 10112 10/ 12 101 12 17120 10/1 2 risers, look for a J u-PHILIPPINES 15/17 17120 171:20 17120 H;!17 101 12 15/17 pt tcr/Vcnu s co n- General band-by-band forecast:PUERTO RICO 15<'17 17120 17120 171:20 17120 15/ 17 15/17 10112 10112 10112 17120 1(1.'12

RUSSIA {CJS I W<O W<O 17120 17120 10112 1(11 12 12115 17120 17120 junction at sunrise.SOliTH AFRICA eceo <0 WOO '000 1(1112 10112 12115 12115 on Ma y 17 th, hot 10 and 12 metersWEST COAST ''''' woo '"00 W<O 3 (>140 10/12 1(1112 10112 15/17 17120

on ly 3 de g re e sCENTRAL UNITED STATES TO:

above the ho ri zon Fairly reg ula r DX may he expected on'ALASKA 10/12 12115 17120 17/:20 ac 17120 17120 10112

and 7 degrees from Good (G) days to Europe and the East be-IARGENTINA 15/17 W l7 '000 woo 17120 10/12 101 12 1211 5IAUSTAALIA 1011:2 15117 15117 17120 eoao ~<O 171:20 12/ 15 1(1112 t he Su n, ma kin g fore noo n. and to Africa shortly after nOOIl .' CENTRAL AM. 15/17 H'17 17120 17120 'MO 10/12 15/17 10/12 1(1112 10/12

possi b le Also. you may lind good hand openings toENGLAND W<O 30140 30140 12/15 12115 17120 17120 vre wt ng

,!-jAWAII 12115 15/ 17 151 17 ,,~ 17120 ecac W<O 17120 1(1112 12/15 1:2115 difficu lt. On the So uth America, the Pacifi c . and the south-INDIA 15/ 17 17120 12115 12115

e ve n ing of l\-lay em hemisphere during the a fternoon. ShortIJAPAN 101 12 12115 17120 17120 17120 ,,~ 17120 1(1112

' MEXICO 10/12 151 17 17120 17120 17/:20 10112 1(1112 101 12 1211 5 12115 Ixth, Mars and Mer- ski p betwee n I.(JOO and 2.l)( )() miles duringPHILIPPINES 10112 15120 17120 1(1112 10112 c ur)' wi II he clo se the day is antici pated for most days.

IPUEATO RICO 15/ 17 15/ 17 '000 20/30 '000 10/1 2 H.... ,2 10112 10/12 11)112RUSSIA {C,I,S,I 12115 1211 5 12115 17120 17120 together. vcry low inSOUTH AFRICA 17120 17120 1211 5 12115 15/17 171:20 the WNW after sun- 15 and 17 meters

WESTERN UNITED STATES TO: se t , hot c o u ld heALASAA 101 12 1(11 12 15/ 17 17120 171:20 17/2Q 17120 171:20 15117 masked by the Sun's

You can look for excellen t daytime OXARGENTINA 101 12 12115 15/ 17 17120 17120 1(1112 11)11 2

glare. Forty minutesto the southern hemisphere and to most ar-

AUSTflALIA 10/12 12115 15/ 17 15/17 17/20 17120 ,,~ 17120 eas of the world. peaking to Europe be foreCENTRAl. AM. 101 12 12115 15/ 17 17 /20 W<O 1(11 12 10112 10112 12/15 befo re local sunriseENGLAND ,,~ 17120 151 17 151 17 171:20 17120

the mo rning o fnoo n and to most other are as of the world

HAWAII 10112 11)112 12/ 15 151 17 'MO '"00 W OO 12115 101 12on

d uring the afternoo n: daytime short skipINDIA 15/ 17 17120 12/15 15/ 17 :\1ay 2Sth. there wil lJAPAN 10112 1(1112 12115 17120 17/20 17120 171:20 1511 7 be a Jupi ter/Satu rn

beyond 1.000 miles will be frequent.MEXICO 10/12 12115

'"~ "00 '000 10112 10112 1(>112 12115PHILIPPINES 10/12 10112 17120 151 17 17120 conj unct ion, hot 20 metersPUEATO !>ICO 10i 12 12/1 5 ,"00 -sao 17/30 1(11 12 10112 10112 12/15 they coul d be tooRUSSIA {CJ,SI ,,~ 17120 171:20 171:20 eo eo acSOUTH AFRICA 17120 ao ac 10112 12/15 12/15 close to the Sun (15 Excellent OX opening s to most areas of

lEAST COAST ''''' ,o~ 3(>140 W<O 3(1140 10112 12/15 12/ 15 15117 171:20 degrees) and masked the world are expected on Good (G) days

60 73 Amateur Radio Today · May 2000

Sque lch (DCS). which also allows yo uto ignore unwanted sig nals. The 1750Hz to ne used fo r Europea n repeaters isa lso included . If you ca n rece ive a sta­t ion but do not know what the to ne re­q ui reme nt is for that s tatio n to acceptyo ur sig nal. thi s radi o can eve n scanfor the required tone . Any tone you cantransmi t c an he detected by scanning ,inc luding crcss or DeS codes, whichis a tremendous benefit while travcJing .1like to have repealers identified a longmy planned route, and if a tone has beenadded or changed since the last repeaterdirectory entry, th is feature is essential toaccessing the repeate r.

Speaking of repeaters. this unit caneven be set to automatic simple x checkerso that it periodically checks the rc­pcutcr input freq uency o n its own andg ive s you a visual indication if you arew ithin range to work the other s tatio nsimplex. If yo u arc trave li ng in an un­familiar territory, it's so metimes diffi­cu lt to determine which repeaters listedin the directory are actually availab leand in usc. The TM-D700A has a vi­sua l scan function that g ive s a graphicrepre senta tion o f the active frcq uen­cies in th e area and th eir re la tive sig na lstre ngth . By slid ing a c ursor to an indi­cated sienal . vou c an mo nitor that fre-• •qucncy, :\0 more random sca nning inorder to find w hich of the 27 re peatersin town arc the popular one s.

Another very convenie nt feature ofthis radio is its programmable me mory(PM ) function . This permits you tosave up to 5 config urations that main­tain key information about your pre­fe rred sett ings . T his cou ld prove veryusefu l if mu ltip le peop le use thc sa merad io so that each cou ld have their ownpreferences a utomatica lly come intoplay with the push o f a buuon. Likewise,you could have o ne PM seuing for e v­eryday use; a sec ond fo r severe weather;a third fo r emergency or disas ter scr­

. vices; a fourt h fo r tra vel ing ; and stillhave one le ft o ver for yo ur spouse.

I to ld you that it ....'o uld take IWo is­sues to tell you about thi s radio . Thismonth we scratcbed the surface o f whatKenwood's latest offering ca n do. Ne xttime, we ' ll look at all the spe c ial fu nc­tions it can pe rfo rm . In the mea ntime ,if yo u ge t a c hance to p lay with a TM­D 700 A. take advantage of it! fa

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 61

j ust amaz ing. S ustained C\V QSO rateso f better than o ne per m inute are quitecommon. a nd in m y two hour stint Iworked statio ns in 42 states.

A fe w weeks ago so meone on QRP-Lcom mented on the "eli tism" of theFirs t Class Operators Club. and the irn­111I..-diate resu lt was the formation of theSecond Class Operators C lub, completewith motto "AGN?:' member numbers.and a co ntest las t weeke nd.

My point is that Qk t'ers, wh ile veryskilled. dedicated, and inventive, arc al­ways m indful that the hobby should hefun . They do a dam good job of kee pingit th at way,

lr's diffic ult to do a gene ral articleon QRP because the topic is so broad. In"traditio nal" ham radio we have spec ialinterest categories for antennas . con­strucuon. design. contesting, DX awards,emeruencv comm unicatio ns, and so on.• •You can pu t QRP in front o f e very oneo f those topics. and it's o nly a s lig htred uc tio n in sco pe, if any. I've wri ttennearl y as much as a Wayne Green ed i­to ria l here. and kep t pretty much onthe single track of "Q RP," ye t I' ve barelyscratched the surface. A nd at the best oftimes words ca n only covey so m uch,so why don 't you try turning down thewick and see ing what you can do withQ RP . .. and what Q RP ca n do for yo u.It will be like d isco vering amate ur rad ioall o ver again . if

Exploring the KenwoodTM-D700Aconunued from toee 16

d isplay, and their func tion is labeled onthe screen. Want to check the inpu t fre­quency o f the station yo u arc working- again the push o f a sing le button .Power ca n he adjusted from a low level(5 waus) to a medium le ve l (10 watts) tothe full po wer of 50 watts o n VHF or35 watts for UHF.

Tone ca n he easi ly switched oil o rby pressing the same button you canactivate the tone to access your favori terepeater. Pressing that hutton again ac­tivates Continuous Tone CodedSque lch Syste m (CTCSS) so that yourreceiver wi ll o n ly respond to sig na lsth at are transm itt ing the correct tone . Ath in! time act ivates Digital Code

from local sunrise until long after sunset.Peak condiuons should occur an hour or twoafter sunrise and again in the laic afternoon.On Good (G l days, OX into Ihe southernhemisphere can be worked during the hoursof darkness as well. Short skip from 500 toover 2.000 miles is anticipated on most days.

30 and 40 meters

These ma y he your best DX bands fromlocal sunset until sunrise, when you canexpect frequent open ings and often strongsignals into the southern hemisphere. Day­time short skip to abou t 1.000 miles is ex­pected. and beyond 750 miles after dark.

80 and 160 meters

world wide ox can be ex pected from lo­cal sunset through the darkness hours onGood (G) nights. limited of course by thun­dcrstor mstatic on some paths. Short skip atnight will extend bet ween 1.000 ami 2.000miles. fa

When Less is MoreconHnu.edjrom p age 13

about j oining-e-re quote their pam­phlct. CQC is "A Colorado club withGlohal Membership." Their hi-monthlymagazine The Low Down is worth thesubscription cost. and in fact you willoften sec it quoted in 73.

If you arc a reader, you wi ll fi ndQRP co lum ns in the major m agazines.and a number o f hooks are avai lablefrom the usual sources. f-- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - --!

Did I sa)' we are a weird bunch? If Jdid. [ meant inventive and playfu l. A fewyears ago a well-known QRPcr. ChuckAdams K7QO (then K5FO.) decidedthat QRP-L members should get awayfrom their computers and onto 40Monce in awhile. so he invented the"QRP· L Fox Hunt:' A single station is"the Fox ' for two hours. and every­body else tries to work him. or "bag afox pelt." The Fox Hunt has become anannual event, wi th Pox operations twicea week through the winter. I had thehonor to he a Fox a fe w weeks ago ,and bel ieve me, you havcn"t worked apileup unti l you have had 150 or morestations ca lling yo u within the space oftwo or three kf-lz . They arc all QR P, hutmany of them have signals o f S-9 or oct­ter, and the " haying o f the hounds" is

ON THE Gocouun ued from page 57

invaluable in a disaster support o pe rat ionunder these ci rcum stance s.

Now I have a se lectio n o f headsets. ear­phones. earplugs. etc.. and there arc advau­taecs o r disadvar uaees to each . I decided• •thai the ideal system wo uld be lightweight.comfortable. and provide good audio in bothdi rectio ns. Fo r situations like thi s, it wou ldbe nice if it had some degree o f noi se can­cellatio n. I reme mbered using a headse t thatmet these c harac teris tics as a pilo t. a ndwondered if a simi lar uni t was availablewhich would work wit h my amateur nudiogear. Afte r a ll. there arc few places noi sierthan the cockpit of a sma ll pisto n-d rivenaircraft. and pilots depend upon the ir co m­m unicatio n gear for more than just casualcon vcrsuuon .

Th e T R -20 0 0 headset f ro m Wa rre nGregoire Associates is just wh at the doctorordered for th is apptlcatiou. It was Warren'sheadse t that J had relied o n in the coc kpitand . as it turns o ut. Warren is K6QX . Ichecked and fou nd that Warren had a head­

se t with a boom microphone specifi callydesigned for amateur radio use . T his head­se t weig hs in at only 12 ounces so that itcan be worn com fortably for lo ng periods.The earpicccs have padded earmuffs thatsig nifica nt ly minimize background noi se .and the padd ing o n the carpieces and 0 11 theheadband e nsure a co m fortable and securefit. S ince pilots tend to wear thei r headse tsfo r lo ng periods of time. their experiencewith aircraft gear has helped. the m to de ­sign a \"Cry practica l and co mforta ble se t.The boom microphone Is spring-loaded and.o nce positio ned. tends to stay where ) 'OU

want it. The electret cle ment in the micro­phone draws it'; power from the microphone

jack o n most modern radios. or a battery ifused with a vintage radio. The acoustic noisecanceling design was developed for usc inthe ai rcraft coc kpit and works we ll in otherno isy e nv ironments. In other words, it's

Do n 't have TiCK kcycr? Get yours from:Embedded Researc h, P. O. Bo x 92492,Rochester NY 14692.Weh: [wwwJrontiemel.

nc v- embrcs/l.Yo u migh t fin d this helpful. too : Ex tra

Stre ngth Tyleno l. Mcrcci t PPC lnc .. FortWashin g ton PA . O r ch ec k yo u r loca lWalgreen ' s o r CVS. Running mltti wausis a c ha llenge, hu t it c an a lso produc eheadaches: m

•

Conrinued on puye 601

Other goodies

Glad you asked . T he Jersey Fireball 40is the product ofthe :"'J-Q RP cl uh. The clubis selling the basi",' 40-meter kit. includingthe PC board , fo r $ 10. Write to ~J·QRP

club, George Hem ~2APB, 45 Fie ldstoneTrail. Sparta NJ 0 7871. Or visit the ir website at [www. njqrp.org] . E-mail: In2aph@amsat.o rg].

Where do I get myJersey Fireba ll 401

QRPconrinuedJrom page 5 6

me, there 's nothing wrong with the JerseyFireball 40. It' s trying to comacr someonewith 40 mW - that' s the kicker. To compli­cate matters. you're rockbound. or should Isay. "can hound." Finding someone cal lingCQon 7.080 is asking fora lot! So, I d id what

Randy KD8JS does. I b ui lt the amplifier!But I only used it when I needed to!

The thinki ng went like this. I would makea co ntact with the o ne- watt amp in line .T he n d rop it o ut o f line . In almost a ll cases,I was still 5 3 copy by the o ther station. Willl be able 10 work 5A IA'! Xopc! But e ve nwith Randy's 58 -220 cooking. he wa s notheard by 5 A l A either. So, it 's not that muc ho f a heartbreaker. I th ink Randy ended upusing MCI 10 make a Q50 with SA I A! SO

it goes ... and that' s anot her story. too.Perso nally. with the Sun spotting up like

a teenager 's face on prom night. I wo uldstick to ei ther 10 or 20 meters. That's go ingto he yo ur be st bet for making QSOs. Re­member that yo u' ll have to supply yo ur OWI1

parts for the o utp ut f ilter. Do n ' t worry, theval ues are listed in the instructions.

Speaki ng of whic h. the insrrucuous fortho Jersey Fireball 40 arc fi rst-class. Not aHeathk it by any means. hut clear and pre­cise . You should no t have any trouble as­sembling or troubles hooting your JerseyFireball 40.

in the last two mo nt hs of 1999 , e xpec tedan answer and didn ' t ge t one. please tryag ain no w. And if yo u' re no t on E- ma il,or ha ve some g reat snapshots to con trtb­ute. then use my Po st Offi ce box . whichhas suffe re d fro m neg lec t ... incc E-ma ilgained popu larity. m

If yo u plan o n stuffing the PC board withthe parts to use the amplifie r. he sure youuse a metal-case 2N222 2. T hey seem towork bette r at RF tha n the p la stic-casejobbies.

Pre-Y2K E-mail bugs

I enjoy ge tting yo ur tran smi tter hunt reopons and RDF stories, most o f which nowcome via E-mai l. I read everyone and tryto reply in a timely manlie r. Unfortunatel y,an E-mail problem urose in early Novem­

ber and took almost two months to o vercome.II affec ts customers using one particular ve r­s io n o f Am eri c a O nlin e so ft wa re fo rMacinto sh computers.

At first. AOL Tech S upport claimed thatthe problem was entire ly on users ' comput­e rs. and insisted that I re lo ad my so ftware.After Ihal d idn' t work. they agreed that itwas a systemwide server prob lem and gaveassurance that it would be fixed soon. Amonth a nd several phone calls later, thecompany admitted that there wac no cer­tal rny thai a timely fix was forthcoming . SoI ended up having to change my soft ware

to another version. which ncc cssuated hard­ware change s 0 11 o ne o f my computers.

By that time. it wa s apparent thai someincoming E-mail and fi les had been irre­tricvably 10s1. So if yo u sent Ecmai l to me

62 73 Amateur Radio Today . May 2000

HOM ING INconunuea fronv page 55

objective was to gel as many of the search­ers 10 the simulated crash site as soon aspossi b le . T his mea nt th at cooperat ionamong RDFcrs wou ld he lmponam. in dis­tinct contrast 10 most competitive Ioxhums.

"Sixteen South Shore fo xhumers parti ci- ~ _

pared in this drill ," wrote organizer GilFullen WAIGDJ of Abington MA. " BradAnselmo N I VUF gave pointers regard ingwhat to do in an actual search and rescue.includ ing how to handle all inj ured vic tim.Brad designated a special call-in frequencyfor when the victim was found. so thai in areal situation there would be less chance ofhaving thai information broadcast prema­turely by the media. He also cautioned thaithe vic tim' s name sho uld nor be staled over

the radio and thai on ly pertinen t generalin fo rmation (suc h as gender, age, and na­ture o f injury ) sho uld be transmit ted."

WAI GDJ had sec tioned o il the map intovario us quadrants so that searchers couldproceed in an organized manner and attemptto triang ulate o n the signa l from the foxbox/ELT. Carl Aveni NIFYZ was net control fo rthe dri ll o perations, using a base station on

battery power running in the parking lo t.Within two and a ha lf hours. a ll teams

had found the toxbox and had practiced re­lay ing: in forma tion regarding injuries of thevolunteer " victims," one of who m turnedout to he Ritchy Guild K13I EAJ . Doe s thisgive yo u some ideas'!

Repr in ls of ~ty Editur'ials frum 73.Very few thingsin this worldarea, we'vcbeen taught. and as they appt'ar. I blowthe whistle 011 the scams around us. suchas the health care. oor school systeru; ourmoney, the drug war. a college education.sugar, thefoodgiants,ourunhealthy food.lluorides. E.\ tFs, :'\utraSWt:e!. etc.1996 F..dituriak : 120 pages. 100 choiceedilorials. S 10 (# 72)

1997 Editoriak: 148 fun-packed pages,2 16 editorials. 510 (11174)199M Editorial..: 168 pages that" II giveyou lots of cOlltrow n ial things 10 tajkabout on the air. $10 (#75)1999 F.ditoriah: 132 pages of ideas,book reviews, health. education, andanything else I think)"OII OUghllOknowabout. $10 (#76)2000 F.ditorials: In the wods..Sih ('r Wire : With IWO 3" pieces ofheavy pure silver wire + three 9V bar­renes you can male a thousand dol­lars worth of silver colloid. What do)'OUdo w ith il? IIdoes whal ille antibi­ones do, but germs can't adapt 10 n.Use it to get rid of germs on food, forskin fungus, warts , and even 10 dri nk,Read some books 011 the uses of silu:rcolloid it's like magic. SIS (#1lOJWa}'nl" s Bell Saver I\:it. The cableand instructions enabling you to in,expensively tape Art Bell W60BB'snightly 5-hr radio talk sho..... . 5S (#83)~l-f Referm Party Keynote Speec h.It wow'd ' em when I laid out plansfor S H in 2020, with much llett~ r, yetlower cost schools, zero state laxes, farbeller health care, a more responsivestate govenullenl, etc. $1 (#85)StuIT I didn ' t write, but ) 'QU 1I\ 't.'di

~ASAMlNllIed America: Rene makesan air-tight case that NASA faked the .f-..Ioon landings. This book will con­vince even you. $25 (#90)

Las t Ske p lie of Sdl'ncl' : This isRene's book where hedebunks a bunchof accepted scientific beliefs - such asthe iceages.~ Earth \:k:ingamagnet, theMoon causing the tides, and elC, $25(#91 )

Dark Moon : 568 pages ofcarefully re­searched proof that the Apollo Moonlandings were a hoax----a capping blowfor Rene's skeptics. $35 (#92)

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I Alto..- 4 IIrCCb fordch...., e>.a-pl f<lm'''- I/Ioug/l_uy '" JCllllOAorden <ItiPJI'd ... 1 dly or IWO. IL~~~______ _ ~

73 Amateur Radio Today • May 2000 63

visit the hams and scuba dive most ofthe islands of the Caribbean. You' llkive Ihc special Liat fare which let mevisit I I countries in 21 days, divingall llut one of the islands, Guadeloupe,Where the hams kept me 100 busy withparties. $5 (# 12)Cold Fu~ion Overvtew: This is botha brief history of cold fusion, which Ipredict will be one of the largest ill ­dustnes in the world in the 21st cen­IU!)', plus a simple explanation of howand ....hy jt ....orks. This new fidd isgoing to generate a .... hole ne.... bunchof billionaires, just as the personalcomputer industry did, 55 (1f20,Cold Fusion Journal: They laughedw hen I predicted the PC ind ust rygro.....th in 1975. Pes are now the thirdlargest industry in the world. The coldfusion ground floor is still wide open.but then that might mean giv ing up.....alChing ball garres, Sample. .$10(#22).Julian SCh.... fnger :A Kobel laureate 'stalk aboercold fusion----confinning ilSvalidity. .$2 (1f24)Improving State Gowrnm('nl : Hereare 24 ways rnat Slale governments canCUI e xpenses enormous ly, while pro-­viding far better scrvice.J explain ho....any government bureau or departmentcan be gouen to CUI it's expenses by atleast 50% in Ihree years and do it eo­operatively and enthusiastically. I ex­plain how, by applying a new technol­ogy, the state can make it possible 10pro\'ide all needed sen.·ices withomhaving to levy allY taxes at all' Readthe book, run for your legislature, andlet' s get busy making this countl)' ....'orklike its founders wanted it to. Don' tleave this for "someone else" to do. $5(#30 ):\lankind's Extinct ion Pred iClions: Ifanyone of tbe experts who have writ,ten books predicting a soon-to-comecatamophe which will virtually wipemost of us out are right, we ' re introuble. In this book I explai n aboutthe various disaster scenarios, likeNostradamus, v.ho says the poles will!IO.XllI shi ft (as they have several times inthe past), wiping out 97% of mankind.Okay, so he's made a long string of pasth.II,:ky gues'ieS. The worst pan of theseprediclions is the accuracy record ofsome of the experts. Will il be a poleshifl, a new ice age, a massi\'e solarnare, a comet or asteroid a biotenuristattack? I'm gening ready, how aboutyou? 5S (" 31)' loondo~gIe: Afler reading Rene 'sbook. NASA M ool/ed Amerir:a. I reade\'eT)·thing I could find on our ~(oonlandings. I watched the \ideas, lookedcarefUll y at lhe photos, read theastronaut' s biogTaphies, and ta lkedwith some of my readeN .....ho workedfor :'\ASA. This book f;ites 25 goodreawns I belie~'e the .....hole Apollo~pam had to have been faked 55 (1f32)C las..ical "usk Guide: A list of 100CDs which will provide )'OU with anouhlanding colleclion of lhe fineslc1a....ical music ever .... rinen. This is

The Bioelectr-ifler IIll11dOOok: Thisexplains how 10 build or buy IS155)a

little electri cal gadget that can helpclean the blood of an)' virus. microbe.parasite. fungus or yeast. The processwas discov ered by sc ientists at theAlben Einstein College of Medicine.quickl)' parenteed, and hu..bed up. It'scuring AIDS. hepatitis C. and a bunchof other serious illnesses. The circuitcan be buill for unJcr S20 from the in­s trucuons in the book. SIO (1I()1)The Sa:1"\'1 G uide 10 \ H o;dom : Th isis a review of around a hunJrcd booksIhal will help )'00 change your life. No.I don't sell thc.'~ books. They're on awide range of subjects and will helpto make you a very int~ r~~t i ng person.wa ir'Il yo u see some of the gems}'ou'\'e missed reading. $5 (1102)The SeCN'1 Gu ide 10 \\'t'Hlth: l ust aswith health, you'll find that )'OUha\'eb.:en brainwashed by "the system" intoa IXlt1em of hfe that will keep you fromever ma king much money and havingthe freeduT1l to travel and do what youwant. I explain how anY(lI\e can get adream job with no college, no resume,and even without any expe rie n~'e , Iexplain how you can get someone tohappily pay you to learn what you n~~d

to know 10 stan your o....'n llusiness, 55(#03)The Secrel Guide to Health ' Yes,there really is a secrel lo regaining )'ourhealth and adding 30 to 60 )'eaN ofhealthy living ((I your lik Th.: arbWl.'f issimple, but il meafl', making !>OITlf: dif­fi eull lifestyle changes. Will }'OU beskiing the slopes of Aspen .... ith mewhen you' re 90 or doddering arounda nursing home? Or pushing up dai­sies? :"0, I' m nol selling any health .prodUCLS. $5 (~)

~I}' \\'\\'11 Submarint' Adwnlurn:Y~ I spent from 1943-1945 on a sub­marine, right in the middle of the warwith l apan. we abnosl got wnk se\'eraltimes, and I....i ce I was in th~ righl plal;eat the rig hi time to sav'e the boat .Wha t's it rea lly like 10 be depthcharg~d? And whal's the daily lifeaboard a submarine like? How aboulthe Amelia Earhart inside slOry?1fyou're near ~lobile, please v'isil lheDrum. 55 (#10)WII}-ne's Carillbean Ad\l:fllurn: Mysuper budget U'3 \'el slories - where I

Here llre ..nme of rn)- ho()k~ whichcan changt' Jour life (if you'J l let'em). If the ideMof twinJ: h l:'lIl1h,-.wealth)"and wiw inle"""b )OU, ..tartrt'lld in j;:. Yh. J Our an he .Il1I that, hUIonl) when JOu kno.. th ... secret..which I'H' sikRI a lifet ime uncover-

'"~

TTT,

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Number 64 on YO ll r Ffl6dback cardBarter 'n' Buy:....- _

Turn yo ur old ham and computer gear into cash now. Sure, you can wail for a hamfest to t ry and dump it, but you know YOU' ll get a far mo rerealistic price if you have it out where 100,000 active ham potential buyers can see it , rather than the few hundred local hams who com e bya flea market tab le, Check your atti c, garage, ce llar and closet shelves and get cash for your ham and compute r gear befo re it's 100 old tosell. You know yo u're not going to use it again , so why leave it for your widow 10 th row out? That sluff isn't getti ng any younger!The 73 Flea Markel , Barter 'n' Buy, costs you peanuts (almost)- comes to 35 cents a word for individual (noncommercial!) ads and $1.00a word for comme rcial ads. Don't plan on telling a long story. Use abbreviat ions , cram it in. But be hones t, There are plenty of hams who loveto fix things, so if it doesn't work, say so,Make your list, count the words, Includlnq your call , add ress and phone number, Include a check or you r credit ca rd number and expiration,If you're placing a commercial ad, include an addit ional phone number, separate from you r ad,This is a monthly magazine , not a daily newspaper, so figure a coup le mon ths before the action starts; then be prepared. If you get too manyca lls, you priced it low. II you don 't get many calls, too high.So get busy. Blow the dust oil, check everything out. make sure it st ill work s right and maybe you can help make a ham newcomer or retiredold timer happy with that rig you 're not using now. Or you might get busy on you r comp uter and put together a list of small gear/parts to sendto those interested ?

Send l our ads a nd payment to: 73 Magazine , Barter ' n ' Buy, 70 Hancock Rd. Peterborough Xlt 03458 and get set for thephone ca lls. T he deadl i ne for the Augus t 20m classified ad section i s June 10, 2000.

President Clinton probably doesn't have a copyof termers Electronics Bench Reference but youshould. Check it out at [www.ohio.neU-rtormeUindex.htm)-over 100 pages of circuits, tables,RF design information , sources, etc. BNB530

TELEGRAPH COLLECTOR'S PRICE GUIDE:250 pictures/pr ices. $12 postpaid, ART IFAXBOOKS, Box 88, Maynard MA 01754. TelegraphMuseum: [http://wltp.com]. BNB113

Great New Reference Manual with over 100 pgsof PIS, transistor, radio, op-amp. antenna oesqns,coil winding tables,etc. See details at [www.ohkJ. net!- rtormetllndex.htm) or send check or M.D. for$19,95 + $2,00 P&H to RMT Engineering, 6863Buffham Rd., Seville OH 44273. BNB202

RFTRANSISTORS TUBES 2SC2879, 2SC1971 ,2SC1972, MRF247. MRF455, MB8719, 2SC1307.2SC2029, MRF454. 2SC3133, 4CX250B, 120 Q6,6KG6A, etc. WESTGATE, 1-800- 213-4563,

BNB6000

OSL CARDS. Basic Styles; Black and White andColor Picture Cards; Custom Printed , Send 2stamps for samples and literature. RAUM'S, 8617Orchard Rd., Coopersburg PA 18036. Phone orFAX (215) 679·7238. BNB519

Cash for Collins: Buy any Collins EquipmentLeo KJ6HI. Tel.lFAX (310) 670-6969, [radiofec eseatthlnk.net]. BNB425

Browse our web site and check out the" Monthly Special." TDL Technology, Inc. www.zianet.comftdl. BNB500

MAHLON LOOMIS, IN VENTOR OF RADIO, byThomas Appleby (copyrig ht 1967). Second print­ing avai lable from JOHAN K.V. SVANHOLMN3RF, SVANHOLM RESEARC H LABORATO­RIES, P,O. Box81, Washington DC 20044. Pleasesend $25,00 donation with $5.00 for S&H.

BNB420

Ham Radio Repair, Quality workmanship. AllBrands, Fast Service, Affordable Electron ics,7110 E. Thomas Rd" Scottsdale, AZ 85251. Call480-970-0963. or E-mail HAM SERVICE@AOLCOM. BNB427

64 73 Amateur Radio Today. May 2000

METHOD TO LEARN MORSE CODE FAST ANDWITHOUT HANGUPS Johan N3RF. Send $1.00& SASE. SVANHOLM RESEARCH LABORATO·RIES. P.O, Box 81, Washington DC 20044 USA.

BNB421

ASTRON power supply, crane-new w!warranty,RS20M $99, RS35M $145, AS50M $209. RS70M$249. Web; [www.aventrade.comj . Call for othermodels, (626) 286-0118. BNB41 1

HEATHKIT COMPANY is selling photocopies ofmost Heathkit manuals , Only authorized sourcefor copyright manuals. Phone: (61 6) 925- 5899,8-4 ET. BNB964

"MORSE CODE DECIPHERED" Simple, er­egant, inexpensive, comprehensive, logical, easy!E-mail Uudlind@earthlink.net]. BNB428

Electricity, Magnetism, GraVity, The Big Bang.New explanation of basic forces of nature in this 91­page book covering earty scientific theories and ex­ploring latest controversial conclusions on their re­lationship to a unified field theory. To order, sendcheck or money order for $16,95 to: American Sci­ence Innovations, PO Box 155, Clarington OH43915. Web site for other prod ucts [http://www.asL2000. com]. BN8100

COLLOIDAL SILVER GENERATORI Why buy a"box of batteries" for hundreds of dollars? Currentregulated. AC powered, tUlly assembled with #12AWG silver electrodes. $74.50. Same, but DC pow­ered, $54.50. Add $2.50 shipping. Thomas Miller,962 Myers Parkway. Ashland OH 44805.

BNB342

COLD FUSION! • FUEL CELL! - ELECTRIC BI·CYCLE1 Each educational kit: (Basic - $99.95. De­luxe - $1 99.95, Information - $9.95.) CATALOG ·$5,00. ELECTRIC AUTOMOBiLE BOOK - $t9.95.KAYLOR-KIT, POB 1550S1, Boulder Creek CA95006·1550. (831) 338-2300. BNB1 28

TELEGRAPH KEYS AT DAYTON HAMFES~

500+ Civi l War - Present. Bring Yours! History, In­formation, Appraisals, pretzels! Buying, Trading ,Selling. SPACE 2555. http://w1tp.com. BNB705

ROHN TOWERS HUGE DiSCOUNTS CHECKPRICES AT HILLRADIO.NET BNB600

Wanted COLLINS S-LINE Pri stine (RE) 32S3­A, 75S3-C, 516F2. 312B4. 30L1, or 30S1 andSM-3. Willing to pay top dollar for the station Ihave wanted since age 13, 1-512-925-3907(cell), 1-888-917-9077(home), toll free residen­tial. willbryant@aol.com WA5JUL Bill Bryant.THIS STATION IS FOR PERSONAL USE, NOTFOR RESALE! BNB700

ON THE Gocontinued f rom page 62

com fortable, works we ll in a real- wendenvironment. and prov ides good audio.

The interesting thi ng about this headsetis that it is available for a very reasonableprice. It costs only $44.95 assem b led. or$29.95 in a kit. A connector kit is av ail ab le

for about tell dollars. de pending upon the

rad io to which it will be connected : The di­

rec tions for the kit arc easy to read and f ol ­

low. and make for one of those quick andeasy projects tha t is j ust plain satisfying,

There arc a couple of accessori es that maymake you r operating m ore p leasant. Thereare t wo types of push-to-talk switches . Ahand-hel d p ush-button located in a tuhularcase fi ts comfortably in the hand. Duringli stening period s it can he draped over theshoulder, or tucked through a belt loop tok eep it handy. There i s also a foot sw itch

that I find very handy, since I often need totake copious notes during di saster support

or other nets. T his k eeps my hands and desk­

top f ree for paper and pencil work .

I like thi s headset and believe i t repre­

sents a l ot o f value for a very small price .C heek out t heir Web site at [www.warrcngregoi re.com}, or yo u can use theirtoll f ree n um ber. I (800) 634-0094. fa

FT·l OOOMPTheradioof choice for world-c lass confest operators,theFT·lOOOMP provkies 100 Walls of power,EnhancedDSP," Duelln-band Receive, Cascaded IFliners,General Coverage RX, and t60-1O MTX. (DC-only¥l!fSion also available.)

FT·920TheFT-920HF/6M Iransceber isdesigned for tollay'sactive Ham, It featureshigh-speed DSP in all modes.127 memory cllannels, AFSK or FSK Digital operation.new-technology MOSm PAfinals. high-speedAutomatic AntennaTUflef, and high-resolutionLCD displa,.

FT-IOOODTruly an elite -classHFmasterpiece. the200 WattFT-IOOOD providesDual Receive(in-band or cross­band), Cascaded IF Filters, ertraordinary OynamicRange, DDS, high-speed Automatic Antenna Tuner,and 100 memory channels.

FT-IOOThis ultra-etlll1pact IfMlFI1JHF 100Wall Transceiver provides SSll, CWoAM. FM and AFSK e:tM!l"a~ of the HF,6/11, 2M and 70 CM bands. Featuresinclude 300 memory channels, buin--inElectronic Memory Keyer, OSP. IFShrtt,IFNoise Blanker. and CTCSSIOCS.

FT-&40Affordable Jet feature lilled.the FT-&4Gis an ideal traYel­ingcompanion. n offersIIi(}..I(lM n With~neral

coverageRX, 100 memorychannels, DDS,CTess,Twin Band Stading vms,andexcellent receiverdynamic range,

FT-rooThis compact 100 Wall HFTransceiver offers the utmostin operating simplicity. TheMIL-SID rated FT-600 coversthe 160-1OM Amateur bandswith General Coverage Receive.100 memory channels. DirectKeypad Frequency Ent ry, anda front-mounted speake r.

VI.-ICllJIVv1>-I000The VI.-tOOO Ouadra 5,stem is a Solid-State LinearAmplifier IeatlJing lour twin-MOSFET PA modulesto prodll:t 1000 Watts 01 clean power output on160-15 Meters (500 Watts on 611I, modillable lorlVIO meters). Included are an Automatic Antennatuner, 2 Input and 4 Output Antenna lads, andextensive status displays on tfe multi·function LCD,

FT-847Theintroductionof the FT-847completely redefinesbase stationeperaton by offeringthree radios in one-HF,VHFIUHFandSatell ite. Afull power multi-modetransceiver. the appropriately named EarthStationcovers theHF. 50 MHz, 144 MHz and 430 MHz bands. and it includescrossband Full Duplex operating capability for satelliteeon. ltsexceptional receiver pertemance is ready for all aspectsof OXworl. thanks10 theOSP fi ltering. Andlor local FM work both eTess and DeS encode/decode arebuilt in. TheFT·847isan engineering breakthroughcttenngjou the earth, thesky, andthe moonin onecompact package.

THE TASK ASTE •They're oul there. Those elusive OX signals that can't poke through the aRM regardless of thetate-night hours you put in try ing to f ind them. But when a Yaesu HF enters the picture, weaksignals suddenly jump into your headphones. veesu's High Frequency transceiver technologyuniquely combines years of RF and AF design know-how with cutt ing edge advancements inIF filtering, noise reduction, and dynamic range. Whether you're on high bands or low, at homeor away, the high frequency technology of Yaesu's task masters Quickly f ills up your log withcontacts. Learn more about vaesu prod ucts on the web at www.yaesu.com

YAE S U Choice of the worters top Drers.Oi999 '-1M. 112lG~ Raod. Cetnb.. Co\ t:l7tl~ 4ll4-ZItlO.~ til dlIr1rt .....__~,....

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